The Gentile Times Reconsidered Chronology Christ

THE GENTILE TIMES 

RECONSIDERED 

Carl Olof Jonsson 

Fourth Edition 

Revised and Expanded 

COMMENTARY PRESS • ATLANTA • 2004

Because of its subject matter, in this book Bible texts are generally 

quoted from the New World Translation (represented by the 

abbreviation NW), published by the Watchtower Bible and Tract 

Society of New York, Inc. Abbreviations for other translations of 

Biblical quotations, listed in the text or in the footnotes, are: 

ASV American Standard Version 

KJV King James Version 

LXX Septuagint Version (Greek) 

MT Masoretic text (Hebrew) 

NAB New American Bible 

NASB New American Standard Bible 

NEB New English Bible 

NIV New International Version 

NKJV New King James Version 

NRSV New Revised Standard Version 

RSV Revised Standard Version 

RV Revised Version 

THE GENTILE TIMES RECONSIDERED 

FIRST EDITION © 1983 by 

Hart Publishers Ltd. of Lethbridge, Alta., Canada and Good News 

Defenders of La Jolla, CA, U.S.A. for Christian Koinonia 

International. 

SECOND EDITION © 1986 

Published by Commentary Press, Atlanta, GA 30336. 

THIRD EDITION, REVISED AND EXPANDED © 1998 

Published by Commentary Press, Atlanta, GA 30336. 

FOURTH EDITION, REVISED AND EXPANDED © 

2004 Published by Commentary Press, Atlanta, GA 

30336. 

Internet edition: Tönis Tönisson, Vretstorp, 2009 

All rights reserved 

Manufactured in the United States of America 

ISBN: 0-914675-07-9 

Library of Congress Catalog Card No.: 86-70168

Contents 

Foreword 

v 

Introduction 1 

1 The History of an Interpretation 23 

2 Biblical and Secular Chronology 72 

3 The Length of Reigns 

of the Neo-Babylonian Kings 89 

4 The Absolute Chronology 

of the Neo-Babylonian Era 153 

5 The Seventy Years for Babylon 191 

6 The “Seven Times” of Daniel 4 236 

7 Attempts to Overcome the Evidence 283 

Appendix 

For Chapter 1 312 






Additional material 

The 20th year of Artaxerxes and the 

“Seventy weeks” of Daniel 382 

Professor Robert R. Newton, “Ptolemy’s Canon”, 

and the “Crime of Claudius Ptolemy” 394 

Rolf Furuli’s First Book – A Critical Review 401 

Rolf Furuli — Sham Scholarship 457 

Rolf Furuli’s Second Book – A Critical Review 484 

Indexes 551

FOREWORD 

T 

HE SUBJECT of the “Gentile times” is a crucial one today for 

millions of persons. Christ employed that phrase on a single 

occasion, as part of his response to his disciples’ question about his 

future coming and the end of the age. In the centuries that 

followed, numerous interpretations and time-applications of his 

expression have developed. 

While this book provides a remarkably broad view of the subject 

it primarily focuses on one prominent interpretation, one that in a 

very real sense defines for millions of Jehovahs Witnesses the time 

in which they live, supplies what they consider a powerful criterion 

to judge what constitutes “the good news of the Kingdom” which 

Christ said would be preached, and acts for them as a touchstone 

for assessing the validity of any religious organization’s claim to 

represent Christ and the interests of his Kingdom. An unusual fact 

is that the foundation of this interpretation is a “borrowed” one, 

since, as the author documents, it originated nearly a half century 

before their own religious organization began to appear on the 

world scene. 

Rarely has a single date played such a pervasive and defining role 

in a religion’s theology as has the date focused on by this 

interpretation: the date of 1914. But there is a date behind that date 

and without its support 1914 is divested of its assigned significance. 

That prior date is 607 B.C.E. and it is the Witness religion’s linking 

of that date with a particular event—the overthrow of Jerusalem by 

Babylon—that lies at the crux of the problem. 

Those of us who have shared in editing this present work and 

who were ourselves, twenty-seven years ago, part of the writing and 

editorial staff at the international headquarters of Jehovah’s 

Witnesses in Brooklyn, New York, can remember the rather 

stunning effect the arrival of a treatise on the “Gentile times” from 

Carl Olof Jonsson it Sweden had on us in August of 1977. Not 

only the volume of the documentation, but even more so the 

weight of the evidence left us feeling somewhat disconcerted. We 

were, in effect, at a loss as to what to do with the material. That 

treatise later formed the basis for Carl: Olof Jonsson’s book The 

v

vi 

THE GENTILE TIMES RECONSIDERED 

Gentile Times Reconsidered, now in its fourth printing. 

When we today read this book we become the beneficiaries of 

more than three decades of thorough and careful research. Not just 

the immense amount of time, but also the means of access to the 

sources of information that made possible so intensive a study, are 

something very few of us would have at our disposal. The author 

has not only made use of such facilities as the British Museum but 

also has had personal communication with, and assistance from, 

members of its staff, as also Assyriologists of various countries. 

The research takes us back some two and a half millennia in the 

past. Many of us may think of those times as “primitive” and it 

thus may come as a surprise to realize how advanced certain 

ancient peoples were, their writings covering not merely historical 

events and monarchical dynasties, but also dealing with dated 

business documents such as ledgers, contracts, inventories, bills of 

sale, promissory notes, deeds, and similar matters. Their 

understanding of astronomy, of the progressive and cyclical 

movements of the lunar, planetary and stellar bodies, in an age 

unequipped with telescopes, is extraordinary. In the light of the 

Genesis statement that those celestial luminaries serve to “mark the 

fixed times, the days and the years,” this takes on true significance, 

particularly in a study in which chronology plays a central role. 1 

Nothing, except the modern atomic clocks, surpasses those 

heavenly bodies in precision in the measurement of time. 

Of the quality of the research into the Neo-Babylonian period, 

Professor of Assyriology Luigi Cagni writes: 

Time and again during my reading [of Jonsson’s book] I was 

overcome by feelings of admiration for, and deep satisfaction with, 

the way in which the author deals with arguments related to the 

field of Assyriology. This is especially true of his discussion of the 

astronomy of Babylonia (and Egypt) and of the chronological 

information found in cuneiform texts from the first millennium 

B.C.E., sources that hold a central position in Jonsson’s 

argumentation. 

His seriousness and carefulness are evidenced in that he has 

frequently contacted Assyriologists with a special competence in 

the fields of astronomy and Babylonian chronology, such as 

Professors H. Hunger, A. J. Sachs, D. J. Wiseman, Mr. C. B. F. 

Walker at the British Museum and others. 

1 Genesis 1:14, NAB.

Foreword 

vii 

With respect to the subject field I am particularly familiar with, 

the economic-administrative texts from the Neo-Babylonian and 

Achaemenid periods, I can say that Jonsson has evaluated them 

quite correctly. I put him to the test during the reading of the 

book. When I finished the reading, I had to admit that he passed 

the test splendidly? 2 

Readers of the first or second edition of this book will find 

much that is new here. Entire sections, including some new 

chapters have been added. Contributing to the readability of the 

book is the inclusion of about thirty illustrations, including letters 

and other documents. Many of the illustrations are rare and will 

undoubtedly be new to most readers. 

The original research behind the book inescapably brought the 

author on a collision course with the Watch Tower organization 

and—not unexpectedly—led to his excommunication as an 

“apostate” or heretic in July 1982. This dramatic story, not told in 

the first two editions, is now presented in the section of the 

Introduction titled “The expulsion.” 

The discussion of the chronology of the Neo-Babylonian period 

has been greatly expanded. The seven lines of evidence against the 

607 B.C.E. date presented in the first two editions have since been 

more than doubled. The evidence from astronomical texts forms a 

separate chapter. The burden of evidence presented in Chapters 3 

and 4 is indeed enormous and reveals an insurmountable 

disharmony with, and refutation of, the chronology of the Watch 

Tower Society for this ancient period. 

Despite the wealth of information from ancient secular sources, 

this book remains primarily Biblical. In the chapter ‘Biblical and 

Secular Chronology” it clears up a common and serious 

misconception as to how we arrive at a ‘Biblical chronology,” as 

also the erroneous idea that a rejection of the Watch Tower’s 607 

B.C.E. date implies a placing of secular chronology as superior to 

such “Biblical chronology.” 

We are confident that the reading of this unique book will aid 

many to gain, not only a more accurate knowledge of the past, but 

also a more enlightened outlook regarding their own time, and 

increased appreciation of the trustworthiness and historicity of the 

Scriptures. 

The Editors 

2 From the preface to the Italian edition of The Gentile Times Reconsidered by Luigi 

Cagni, Professor of Assyriology at the University of Naples, Italy. Professor Cagni 

was, among other things, a leading expert on the Ebla tablets ,the about 16,000 

cuneiform texts that have been excavated since 1975 in the roya1 palace of the 

ancient city of Ebla (present Arabic name: Tell Mardikh) in Syria. Luigi Cagni died 

in January, 1998.

viii

THE GENTILE TIMES 

RECONSIDERED 

T 

INTRODUCTION 

HE DISILLUSIONING and sometimes dramatic process that 

ended up in the decision to publish this treatise could fill a 

whole book. Due to considerations of space, however, that 

background can be only touched upon briefly here. Jehovah’s 

Witnesses are taught to put great trust in the Watch Tower Society 

and its leadership. Toward the end of my twenty-six years as an 

active Jehovah’s Witness, however, the signs indicating that such 

trust was mistaken had mounted. To the very last I had hoped that 

the leaders of the organization would honestly face the facts 

respecting their chronology, even if those facts should prove fatal 

to some of the central doctrines and unique claims of their 

organization. But when at last I realized that the Society’s leaders— 

apparently for reasons of organizational or “ecclesiastical” policy 

— were determined to perpetuate what, in the final analysis, 

amounts to a deception of millions of persons, doing this by 

suppressing information which they regarded and continue to 

regard as undesirable, no other course seemed open to me but to 

publish my findings, thus giving every individual who has a 

concern for truth an opportunity to examine the evidence and draw 

his or her own conclusions. 

We are each responsible for what we know. If a person has 

information on hand that others need in order to get a correct 

understanding of their situation in life— information that furthermore is 

withheld from them by their religious leaders—then it would be morally 

wrong to remain silent. It becomes his or her duty to make that 

information available to all who want to know the truth, however 

this may appear. That is the reason why this book has been 

published. 

1

2 THE GENTILE TIMES RECONSIDERED 

The role of chronology in the teachings of the 

Watch Tower Society 

Few people are fully cognizant of the very central role played by 

chronology in the claims and teachings of the Watch Tower 

Society. Even many of Jehovah’s Witnesses are not fully aware of 

the indissoluble connection between the Society’s chronology and 

the message they preach from door to door. Confronted with the 

many evidences against their chronology, some Jehovah’s 

Witnesses tend to downplay it as something they somehow can do 

without. “Chronology is not so important, after all,” they say. Many 

Witnesses would prefer not to discuss the subject at all. Just how 

important, then, is the chronology for the Watch Tower 

organization? 

An examination of the evidence demonstrates that it constitutes 

the very foundation for the claims and message of this movement. 

The Watch Tower Society claims to be God’s “sole channel” 

and “mouthpiece” on earth. Summing up its most distinctive 

teachings: it asserts that the kingdom of God was established in 

heaven in 1914, that the “last days” began that year, that Christ 

returned invisibly at that time to “inspect” the Christian 

denominations, and that he finally rejected all of them except the 

Watch Tower Society and its associates, which he appointed in 

1919 as his sole “instrument” on earth. 

For about seventy years, the Society employed Jesus’ words at 

Matthew 24:34 about “this generation” to teach clearly and 

adamantly that the generation of 1914 would positively not pass 

away until the final end came at the “battle of Armageddon,” when 

every human alive except active members of the Watch Tower 

organization would be destroyed forever. Thousands of Jehovah’s 

Witnesses of the “1914 generation” fully expected to live to see and 

to survive that doomsday and then to live forever in paradise on 

earth. 

As decades went by, leaving 1914 ever farther behind, this claim 

became increasingly difficult to defend. After 80 years had passed, 

the claim became virtually preposterous. So, in the November 1, 

1995, issue of the Watchtower (pages 10 through 21), a new 

definition of the phrase “this generation” was adopted, one that 

allowed the organization to “unlink” it from the date of 1914 as a 

starting point. Despite this monumental change, they still retained the 

1914 date—in fact they could not do otherwise without dismantling 

their major teachings regarding Christ’s “second presence,” the 

start of the “time of the end,” and the appointment of their


1914 — The Generation That Would not pass away! 

organization as Christ’s unique instrument and God’s sole channel 

on earth. Though now recognizing “this generation” as defined by 

its characteristics rather than by a chronological period (with a 

particular starting point), they still found a way to include 1914 in 

their new definition. They accomplished this by including in the


definition an arbitrarily added factor, namely, that the “generation” 

is composed of “those persons who see the sign of Christ’s 

presence but fail to mend their ways,” resulting in their destruction. 

Since the official teaching continues to be that the “sign of Christ’s 

presence” became visible from and after 1914, this allows for the 

date’s continuing to form a key part of the definition of “this 

generation.” 

All these factors, then, bear testimony to the highly crucial role 

that 1914 plays in the teaching of the Watch Tower Society. Since 

the date itself obviously is not stated in Scripture, what is its 

source? 

That date is a product of a chronological calculation, according 

to which the so-called “times of the Gentiles” referred to by Jesus 

at Luke 21:24 constitute a period of 2,520 years, beginning in 607 

B.C.E. and ending in 1914 CE. 1 This calculation is the real basis of the 

principal message of the movement. Even the Christian gospel, the “good 

news” of the kingdom (Matthew 24:14), is claimed to be closely 

associated with this chronology. The gospel preached by other 

professed Christians, therefore, has never been the true gospel. Said 

The Watchtower of May 1, 1981, on page 17: 

Let the honest-hearted person compare the kind of preaching 

of the gospel of the Kingdom done by the religious systems of 

Christendom during all the centuries with that done by Jehovah’s 

Witnesses since the end of World War I in 1918. They are not one 

and the same kind. That of Jehovah’s Witnesses is really “gospel,” 

or “good news,” as of God’s heavenly kingdom that was established by the 

enthronement of his Son Jesus Christ at the end of the Gentile Times in 1914. 

[Italics mine.] 

In agreement with this, The Watchtower of May 1, 1982, stated 

that, “of all religions on earth, Jehovah’s Witnesses are the only 

ones today that are telling the people of earth this ‘good news’.” 

(Page 10) A Jehovah’s Witness who attempts to tone down the role 

of chronology in the Society’s teaching simply does not realize that 

he or she thereby radically undermines the major message of the 

movement. Such a “toning down” is not sanctioned by the 

1 The designations “B.C.E.” (Before the Common Era) and “C.E.” (Common Era) 

customarily used by Jehovah’s Witnesses, correspond to “B.C” and “A.D.” They are 

often used in scholarly literature, especially by Jewish authors, and have been 

adopted by the Watch Tower Society , as will be seen in the subsequent quotations 

from the Watch Tower publications . For the sake of consistency, these 

designations, B.C.E. and C.E., are regularly used in this work, the exception being 

where material is quoted in which the B.C. and A.D. designations are employed.


Watch Tower leadership. On the contrary, The Watchtower of 

January 1, 1983, page 12, emphasized that “the ending of the 

Gentile Times in the latter half of 1914 still stands on a historical 

basis as one of the fundamental Kingdom truths to which we must hold 

today.” 2 

The hard reality is that the Watch Tower Society views rejection 

of the chronology pointing to 1914 as a sin having fatal 

consequences. That God’s kingdom was established at the end of 

the “Gentile times” in 1914 is stated to be “the most important 

event of our time,” beside which “all other things pale into 

insignificance.” 3 Those who reject the calculation are said to incur 

the wrath of God. Among them are “the clergy of Christendom” 

and its members, who, because they do not subscribe to that date, 

are said to have rejected the kingdom of God and therefore will be 

“destroyed in the ‘great tribulation’ just ahead.” 4 Members of 

Jehovah’s Witnesses who openly question or discard the calculation 

run the risk of very severe treatment. If they do not repent and 

change their minds, they will be disfellowshipped and classified as 

evil “apostates,” who will “go, at death, . . . to Gehenna,” with no 

hope of a future resurrection. 5 It makes no difference if they still 

believe in God, the Bible, and Jesus Christ. When one of the 

readers of The Watchtower wrote and asked, “Why have Jehovah’s 

Witnesses disfellowshipped (excommunicated) for apostasy some 

2 Italics and emphasis added. The Watch Tower Society’s former president, Frederick 

W. Franz, in the morning Bible discussion for the headquarters family on 

November 17, 1979, stressed even more forcefully the importance of the 1914 date 

by saying: “The sole purpose of our existence as a Society is to announce the 

Kingdom established in 1914 and to sound the warning of the fall of Babylon the 

Great. We have a special message to deliver.” (Raymond Franz, In Search of 

Christian Freedom, Atlanta: Commentary Press, 1991, pp. 32, 33). 

3 The Watchtower, January 1, 1988, pp. 10, 11. 

4 The Watchtower, September 1, 1985, pp. 24, 25. 

5 The Watchtower, April 1, 1982, p. 27. In The Watchtower of July 15, 1992, page 12, 

such dissidents are described as “enemies of God” who are “intensely hating 

Jehovah.” The Witnesses, therefore, are urged to “hate” them “with a complete 

hatred.” This exhortation was repeated in The Watchtower of October 1, 1993, page 

19, where the “apostates” are stated to be so “rooted in evil” that “wickedness has 

become an inseparable part of their nature.” The Witnesses are even told to ask 

God to kill them, in imitation of the psalmist David, who prayed of his enemies: “O 

that you, O God, would slay the wicked one!” In this way the Witnesses “leave it to 

Jehovah to execute vengeance” Such rancorous attacks on former members of the 

organization reflect an attitude that is exactly the reverse of that recommended by 

Jesus in his Sermon on the Mount.—Matthew 5:43–48.


who still profess belief in God, the Bible, and Jesus Christ?” the 

Society answered, among other things: 

Approved association with Jehovah’s Witnesses requires 

accepting the entire range of the true teachings of the Bible, 

including those Scriptural beliefs that are unique to Jehovah’s 

Witnesses. What do such beliefs include? . . . That 1914 marked the 

end of the Gentile times and the establishment of the Kingdom of God in the 

heavens, as well as the time for Christ’s foretold presence. [Italics mine] 6 

No one, therefore, who repudiates the calculation that the 

“Gentile times” expired in 1914, is approved by the Society as one 

of Jehovah’s Witnesses. In fact, even one who secretly abandons the 

Society’s chronology and thus may still formally be regarded as one 

of Jehovah’s Witnesses, has, in reality, rejected the essential 

message of the Watch Tower Society and, according to the 

organization’s own criterion, is factually no longer a part of the 

movement. 

How this research began 

For one of Jehovah’s Witnesses to question the validity of this 

basic prophetic calculation is, then, no easy matter. To many 

believers, especially in a closed religious system such as the Watch 

Tower organization, the doctrinal system functions as a sort of 

“fortress” inside which they may seek shelter, in the form of 

spiritual and emotional security. If some part of that doctrinal 

structure is questioned, such believers tend to react emotionally; 

they take a defensive attitude, sensing that their “fortress” is under 

attack and that their security is threatened. This defense mechanism 

makes it very difficult for them to listen to and examine the 

arguments on the matter objectively. Unwittingly, their need for 

emotional security has become more important to them than their 

respect for truth. 

To reach behind this defensive attitude so common among 

Jehovah’s Witnesses in order to find open, listening minds is 

extremely difficult—especially when so basic a tenet as the 

“Gentile times” chronology is being questioned. For such 

questioning rocks the very foundations of the Witness doctrinal 

system and therefore often causes Witnesses at all levels to become 

belligerently defensive. I have repeatedly experienced such 

reactions ever since 1977 when I first presented the material in this 

volume to the Governing Body of Jehovah’s Witnesses. 

6 The Watchtower, April 1, 1986, pp. 30,31.


It was in 1968 that the present study began. At the time, I was a 

“pioneer” or full-time evangelist for Jehovah’s Witnesses. In the 

course of my ministry, a man with whom I was conducting a Bible 

study challenged me to prove the date the Watch Tower Society 

had chosen for the desolation of Jerusalem by the Babylonians, that 

is 607 B.C.E. He pointed out that all historians marked that event 

as having occurred about twenty years later, in either 587 or 586 

B.C.E. I was well aware of this, but the man wanted to know the 

reasons why historians preferred the latter date. I indicated that 

their dating surely was nothing but a guess, based on defective 

ancient sources and records. Like other Witnesses, I assumed that 

the Society’s dating of the desolation of Jerusalem to 607 B.C.E. 

was based on the Bible and therefore could not be upset by those 

secular sources. However, I promised the man I would look into 

the matter. 

As a result, I undertook a research that turned out to be far 

more extensive and thoroughgoing than I had expected. It 

continued periodically for several years, from 1968 until the end of 

1975. By then the growing burden of evidence against the 607 

B.C.E. date forced me reluctantly to conclude that the Watch 

Tower Society was wrong. 

Thereafter, for some time after 1975, the evidence was discussed 

with a few close, research-minded friends. Since none of them 

could refute the evidence demonstrated by the data I had collected, 

I decided to develop a systematically composed treatise on the 

whole question which I determined to send to the headquarters of 

the Watch Tower Society at Brooklyn, New York. 

That treatise was prepared and sent to the Governing Body of 

Jehovah’s Witnesses in 1977. The present work, which is based on 

that document, was revised and expanded during 1981 and then 

published in a first edition in 1983. During the years that have 

passed since 1983, many new finds and observations relevant to the 

subject have been made, and the most important of these have 

been incorporated in the last two editions. The seven lines of 

evidence against the 607 B.C.E. date presented in the first edition, 

for example, have now been more than doubled. 

Correspondence with the Watch Tower headquarters 

In 1977 I began to correspond with the Governing Body 

concerning my research. It soon became very evident that they 

were unable to refute the evidence produced. In fact, there was not 

even an attempt made to do so until February 28, 1980. In the


meantime, however, I was repeatedly cautioned not to reveal my 

findings to others. For example, in a letter from the Governing 

Body dated January 17, 1978, the following warning was given: 

However, no matter how strong the argumentation may 

be in support of those views, they must, for the 

present, be regarded as your personal viewpoint. It is 

not something that you should talk about or try to 

advance among other members of the congregation. 7 

And further, in a letter dated May 15, 1980, they stated: 

We are sure you appreciate that it would not be 

appropriate for you to begin to state your views and 

conclusions on chronology that are different than 

those published by the Society so as to raise serious 

questions and problems among the brothers. 8 

I accepted such advice, as I was given the impression that my 

spiritual brothers at the Watch Tower headquarters needed time to 

reexamine the whole subject thoroughly. In their first reply to my 

treatise, dated August 19, 1977, they had stated: “We are sorry that 

the press of work here has not allowed us to give it the attention 

we would like to up to the present time.” And in the letter of 

January 17,1978, they wrote: 

We have not had the opportunity of examining this material as 

yet, as other urgent matters are occupying our attention. 

However, we will look into this material when we have the 

opportunity.... You can be assured that your views will be 

examined by responsible brothers.... In due course we hope to 

look into your treatise and evaluate what is contained therein. 

Judging from these and similar statements, Watch Tower 

officials at the Brooklyn headquarters seemed prepared to examine 

the data presented to them honestly and objectively. In a very short 

time, however, the whole matter took quite a different course. 

Interrogation and defamation 

Early in August, 1978, Albert D. Schroeder, a member of the 

Governing Body, held a meeting in Europe with representatives 

7 Names of the authors of letters from the Watch Tower Society are never given. 

Instead, internal symbols are used. The symbol “GEA” in the upper left corner of 

this letter shows that the author was Lloyd Barry, one of the members of the 

Governing Body. 

8. The symbol “EF” shows the writer of this letter to have been Fred Rusk of the 

Writing Department.

Introduction 9


from European Watch Tower branch offices. At that meeting, he 

told the audience that there was a campaign going on both inside 

the movement and from outside to have the Society’s 607 B.C.E.– 

1914 C.E. chronology overthrown. 9 The Society, however, had no 

intention of abandoning it, he stated. 

Three weeks later, on September 2, I was summoned to a 

hearing before two representatives of the Watch Tower Society in 

Sweden, Rolf Svensson, one of the two district overseers in the 

country, and Hasse Hulth, a circuit overseer. I was told that they 

had been commissioned by the Society’s branch office to hold such 

a hearing because “the brothers” at the Brooklyn headquarters 

were deeply concerned about my treatise. Once again I was 

cautioned not to spread the information I had gathered. Rolf 

Svensson also told me that the Society did not need or want 

individual Jehovah’s Witnesses to become involved in research of 

this kind. 

Partly as a result of this meeting, I resigned from my position as 

an elder in the local congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses and also 

from all my other tasks and assignments in the congregation and 

the circuit. I did this in the form of a lengthy letter, addressed to 

the local eldership and the circuit overseer, Hasse Hulth, in which I 

briefly explained the reasons for the position I had taken. Soon it 

became widely known among my Witness brothers in different 

parts of Sweden that I had rejected the chronology of the Society. 

In the following months, I and others who had questioned the 

chronology began to be condemned privately as well as from the 

platforms of Kingdom Halls (congregational meeting places) and at 

Witness assemblies or conventions. We were publicly characterized 

in the most negative terms as “rebellious,” “presumptuous”, “false 

prophets,” “small prophets who have worked out their own little 

chronology,” and “heretics.” We were called “dangerous elements 

in the congregations,” “evil slaves,” “blasphemers,” as well as 

“immoral, lawless ones.” Privately, some of our Witness brothers, 

including a number of the Watch Tower Society’s traveling 

representatives, also intimated that we were “demon-possessed,” 

that we had “flooded the Society with criticism” and that we 

“should have been disfellowshipped long ago” These are just a 

9 Except for my treatise, which came from inside the movement, Schroeder could 

have had in mind two non-Witness publications which attack the Society’s 

chronology: The Jehovah’s Witnesses and Prophetic Speculation, by Edmund C. 

Gross (Nutley, N. J.: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1972), and 1914 

and Christ’s Second Coming by William MacCarty (Washington, D. C.: Review and 

Herald Publishing Association, 1975).


few examples of the widespread defamation, one that has gone on 

ever since, although no names, for obvious legal reasons, have ever 

been mentioned publicly. 

That such obvious slander was not just a local phenomenon, but 

had the sanction of the Governing Body of Jehovah’s Witnesses, 

was evident from the fact that similar statements were printed in 

The Watchtower magazine. 10 

This description of the situation that developed has not been 

given in order to criticize Jehovah’s Witnesses as individuals. These 

people are usually kind and sincere in their belief. The description 

has rather been given to illustrate how easily an individual may 

unwittingly fall prey to the irrational, psychological reactions 

described earlier in this introduction. In a letter to Albert 

Schroeder, dated December 6, 1978, I described the new turn of 

events, calling attention to the sad fact that although my treatise 

had been composed with the greatest thoughtfulness and sent to 

the Society in all sincerity, I had become the victim of 

backstabbing, vilification and character assassination: 

How tragic, then, to observe how a situation develops, where 

the attention is drawn away from the question raised— the validity 

of the 607 B .C.E. date—and directed to the person who raised it, 

and he—not the question — is regarded as the problem! How is it 

possible that a situation of this kind develops in our movement? 

The answer to this question, one to which the Society never 

officially responded, is to be found in the psychological defense 

mechanism described by Dr. H. Dale Baumbach: 

Insecure individuals, when faced with a problem which 

highlights their insecurity, instinctively respond by attempting to 

10 Abandoning the 607 B.C.E.–1914 C.E. calculation also implies abandoning those 

interpretations founded upon it such as the idea that God’s kingdom was 

established in 1914 and that Christ’s “invisible presence” began in that year. Of 

Jehovah’s Witnesses who cannot embrace such views, The Watchtower of July 15, 

1979, stated on page 13: “Lawless persons have even tried to penetrate the true 

Christian congregation, arguing that the ‘promised presence’ of our Lord is not in 

this day . . . Persons of this kind are included in Jesus’ warning recorded at 

Matthew 7:15–23: ‘Be on the watch for the false prophets that come to you in 

sheep’s covering, but inside they are ravenous wolves. . . . In that day I will confess 

to them: I never knew you! Get away from me, you workers of lawlessness.” 

Further, The Watchtower of August 1,1980, page 19, said: “Peter was also speaking 

of the danger of being led away’ by some within the Christian congregation who 

would become ‘ridiculers,’ making light of the fulfillment of prophecies concerning 

Christ’s ‘presence’ and adopting a law-defying attitude toward ‘the faithful and 

discreet slave,’ the Governing Body of the Christian congregation and the 

appointed elders” [Italics mine] See also paragraph 11 on the same page and 

paragraph 14 on page 20 of the same issue.


destroy that which addresses their insecurity or to banish it to the 

recesses of the mind. 11 

Awareness of this defense mechanism, it is hoped, will help 

those readers who are associated with Jehovah’s Witnesses to 

examine the evidence presented in this work with due 

consideration and an open mind. 

Eventually the Watch Tower Society did attempt to refute the 

evidence against the 607 B.C.E. date, but this was not done until a 

special representative of the Governing Body in Sweden had 

written to the Society asking them to provide an answer to the 

content of the treatise sent to them, telling them that the author was 

still waiting for a reply. This representative was the coordinator of 

the Society’s work in Sweden, Bengt Hanson. 

Hanson had paid me a visit on December 11, 1979, to discuss 

the situation that had developed. During our discussion, he was 

brought to realize that it was the evidence I had presented to the 

Society against the 607 B.C.E. date—not me, my motives or 

attitude—that was the real issue. If the evidence against the 607 

B.C.E. date was valid, this was a problem that should be of equal 

concern to every Witness in the organization. Under such 

circumstances, my personal attitude and motives were as irrelevant 

as those of other Witnesses. 

As a result of this, early in 1980, Hanson wrote a letter to the 

Governing Body explaining the situation, telling them that I was 

still waiting for a reply to the evidence I had brought against their 

chronology. And so, at long last, nearly three years after my 

sending them the research material, in a letter dated February 28, 

1980, an attempt was made to tackle the question instead of the 

questioner. 

The argumentation presented, however, turned out to be largely 

a repetition of earlier arguments found in various places in the 

Watch Tower Society’s literature, arguments which had already been 

demonstrated in the treatise to be unsatisfactory. In a letter dated March 

31, 1980, I answered their arguments and added two new lines of 

evidence against the 607 B.C.E. date. Thus the Society not only 

11 Spectrum, Vol. 11, No.4, 1981, p.63. (This journal was published by the 

Associations of Adventist Forums, Box 4330, Takoma Park, Maryland, U.S.A.) The 

Awake! magazine of November 22, 1984, similarly explained that such behaviour 

is a sign of “a closed mind,” saying: “For example, if we are unable to defend our 

religious views , we may find ourselves lashing out against those who challenge 

our beliefs, not with logical arguments, but with slurs and innuendos . This 

smacks of prejudice and of a closed mind.” (Page 4; compare also the Awake! of 

May 22, 1990, page 12.)


failed to defend its position successfully, but the evidence against it 

also became considerably stronger. 

No further attempt to deal with the whole matter was made by 

the Society until the summer of 1981, when a short discussion of it 

appeared as an “Appendix” to the book “Let Your Kingdom Come” 

(pages 186–189). This latest discussion added nothing new to the 

earlier arguments, and to anyone who has carefully studied the 

subject of ancient chronology, it appears to be no more than a 

feeble attempt to save an untenable position by concealing facts. 

This is clearly demonstrated in the last chapter of this present 

work, titled “Attempts to overcome the evidence.” The contents of 

the Watch Tower Society’s “Appendix,” however, finally convinced 

me that the leaders of this organization were clearly not prepared to let facts 

interfere with traditional fundamental doctrines. 

”Waiting upon Jehovah” 

It may be noted that while the Society’s officers feel perfectly free 

to publish any argument in support of their chronology, they have 

gone to great lengths to try to keep Jehovah’s Witnesses at large in 

ignorance of the heavy burden of evidence against it. Thus they had 

not only repeatedly cautioned me not to share my evidence against 

the 607 B.C.E. date with others, but they have also supported the 

widespread defamation of any and all Jehovah’s Witnesses who 

have questioned the organization’s chronology. This mode of 

procedure is not only unfair towards those who have questioned it; 

it is also most unfair towards Jehovah’s Witnesses in general. They 

have a right to hear both sides of the issue and learn all the facts. 

That is why I decided to publish The Gentile Times Reconsidered. 

Interestingly, various arguments have been advanced by 

representatives of the Watch Tower Society to justify the position 

that facts and evidence which go contrary to its teachings should 

not be made known among Jehovah’s Witnesses. One line of 

reasoning goes as follows: Jehovah reveals the truth gradually 

through his “faithful and ‘discreet slave” class, whom Christ has 

appointed “over all his belongings.” (Matthew 24:47, NW) This 

“slave” class expresses itself through those who oversee the 

publishing and writing of Watch Tower literature. We should, 

therefore, wait upon Jehovah—wait, in other words, until the 

organization publishes “new truths.” Anyone who “runs ahead” of 

the organization is therefore presumptuous, for he thinks he knows 

better than “the faithful and discreet slave.”


Such an argument, however, is invalid if the Society’s suppositions 

regarding Bible chronology are wrong. How so? Because the very concept 

that it is possible today to identify a “faithful and discreet slave 

class,” whom Christ, as the “master” in the parable at Matthew 

24:45–47, has appointed “over all his belongings,” rests 

unequivocally on the chronological calculation that the “master” arrived 

in 1914 and made such an appointment a few years later in 1919. 

If, as will be shown in this work, the Gentile times did not end in 

1914, then the basis for claiming that Christ returned in that year 

disappears, and Watch Tower leaders cannot claim to have been 

appointed “over all his belongings” in 1919. If this is so, neither 

can they rightfully claim a divinely-assigned monopoly on 

publishing “the truth.” 

It should also be noted that it is the “master” of the parable 

who, on his arrival, decides who is “the faithful and discreet slave,” 

not the slaves themselves. So, for a group of individuals to claim—in 

the “master’s” absence—to be “the faithful and discreet slave,” 

elevating themselves over all the master’s “belongings,” is itself 

grossly presumptuous. On the other hand, an individual who claims for 

himself no lofty position can hardly be regarded as presumptuous if 

he publishes information that contradicts some of the teachings of 

the Watch Tower Society. 

To “wait upon Jehovah,” of course, is the duty of every 

Christian. Unfortunately, the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society, 

like many other apocalyptic movements, has time and again 

“announced” that the time has come for the fulfillment of God’s 

prophecies, doing this in each case without regard to God’s own 

“times and seasons” for their fulfillment. This has been the case 

ever since the very beginning in the 1870s. 

When the leaders of the Watch Tower movement for about 55 

years (1876–1931) persistently taught that Christ had arrived 

invisibly in 1874, were they setting an example of “waiting upon 

Jehovah”? 

When they taught that the “remnant” of Christ’s church would 

be changed (1 Thessalonians 4:17), first in 1878, then in 1881, then 

in 1914, then in 1915, then in 1918, and then again in 1925, did 

they “wait upon Jehovah”? 12 

12 The Watch Tower, February 1, 1916, p. 38; September 1, 1916, pp. 264, 265; July 

1, 1920, p. 203.


When they taught that the end of the present system of things 

would come in 1914, then in 1918–20, then in 1925, then about 

1941–42, and then again about 1975, were they “waiting upon 

Jehovah”? 13 

If 1914 is not the terminal point of the “Gentile times” as the 

Watch Tower Society continues to hold, then the numerous 

current “prophetic” applications stemming from it are additional 

proofs that the Society still is not prepared to “wait upon Jehovah.” 

In that light and under such circumstances it seems a bit misplaced 

to advise others to “wait upon Jehovah.” The one who genuinely 

wants to wait upon Jehovah cannot simply wait until the leaders of 

the Watch Tower Society are prepared to do that. If, upon careful 

consideration of the evidence he comes to the conclusion that the 

Watch Tower Society has produced, within the framework of its 

chronology, a clearly arbitrary “fulfillment” of Bible prophecy in 

our time, then he needs to dissociate himself from the persistent 

attempts made to impose that arbitrary position on others as 

required belief. Then he could rightly be said to be prepared to 

start “waiting upon Jehovah.” 

The expulsion 

For over a century the Watch Tower publications have been filled 

with a massive and continuous criticism of the errors and evils of 

other Christian denominations. Even if this criticism often has 

been sweeping and superficial, it has not infrequently also hit the 

target. The Watch Tower literature often has denounced the 

intolerance shown in the past by various churches against dissident 

members. “Christendom has had it fanatics—from people who set 

themselves on fire in political protest to individuals acting intolerantly 

toward those holding different religious views,” noted The Watchtower of July 

15, 1987, page 28. This kind of intolerance found a frightening 

expression in the Inquisition, which was established by the Roman 

Catholic Church in the 13th century and lasted for over six 

centuries. The word “Inquisition” is derived from the Latin word 

inquisition, meaning “examination.” It is briefly described as “a 

court established by the Roman Catholic Church in order to 

13 The Time Is At Hand (= Vol. 2 of the series Studies in the Scriptures, published in 

1889), pp. 76-78; The Finished Mystery (= Vol. 7 of Studies in the Scriptures, 

published in 1917), pp. 129,178,258,404,542; Millions Now Living Will Never Die! 

(1920), p. 97; The Watchtower, Sept. 9, 1941,p. 288; Awake!, Oct. 8, 1966, pp. 19, 

20; The Watchtower, May 1, 1968, pp. 271–272.


discover and punish heretics and apostates.” 14 What was the 

situation of the people under this intolerant clergy rule? The 

Watchtower of September 1, 1989, explains on page 3: 

No one was free to worship as he pleased or to express 

opinions conflicting with those of the clergy. This clerical 

intolerance created a climate of fear throughout Europe. The 

church established the Inquisition to root out individuals who 

dared to hold different views. 

Such statements might give the impression that the Watch Tower 

Society, in contrast to the Roman Catholic Church in the Middle 

Ages, acts with tolerance toward members who “hold different 

religious views” and defends their right to express opinions 

conflicting with the teachings of the organization. The truth is, 

however, that this organization takes exactly the same attitude to 

members holding different religious opinions as did the medieval 

Catholic Church. “Beware of those who try to put forward their 

own contrary opinions,” cautioned The Watchtower of March 15, 

1986, page 17. In answer to the question why Jehovah’s Witnesses 

have “disfellowshipped (excommunicated) for apostasy some who 

still profess belief in God, the Bible, and Jesus Christ,” the Watch 

Tower Society said: 

Those who voice such an objection point out that many 

religious organizations claiming to be Christian allow dissident 

views. . . . However, such examples provide no grounds for our 

doing the same. . . . Teaching dissident or divergent views is not 

compatible with true Christianity. 15 

The Watch Tower Society has even established examination 

courts similar to those organized by the Roman Catholic Church in 

the Middle Ages, the only essential difference being that the 

Society’s “judicial committees” have no legal authority to torture 

their victims physically. I knew that the conclusions I had reached 

would eventually cause me to be tried and expelled by such a 

“court of inquisition,” provided that I did not leave the 

organization of my own accord before that. But I knew, too, that 

the consequences in both cases would be the same. 

After twenty-six years as an active Jehovah’s Witness I was now, 

in 1982, prepared to leave the Watch Tower organization. It was 

quite clear to me that this would mean a complete break with the 

14 The Swedish encyclopaedia Nordisk Familjebok, Vo1.11 (Malmö: Förlagshuset 

Norden AB, 1953), p. 35. 

15 The Watchtower, April 1, 1986, pp. 30, 31.


whole social world I had been a part of during all those years. The 

rules of the Watch Tower Society require Jehovah’s Witnesses to 

cut off all contacts with those who break with the organization, 

whether this break occurs by excommunication or by a voluntary 

resignation. I knew that I would not only lose virtually all my 

friends, but also all my relatives within the organization (of which 

there were over seventy, including a brother and two sisters with 

their families, cousins and their families, and so on). I would be 

regarded and treated as “dead,” even if my physical “execution” 

would have to be postponed until the imminent “battle of 

Armageddon,” a battle in which the Witnesses expect Jehovah God 

to annihilate forever all who are not associated with their 

organization. 16 

For some time I had been trying to prepare myself emotionally 

for this break. My plan was to publish my treatise as a public 

farewell to the movement. However, I did not manage to get the 

material ready for publication before a letter arrived from the 

Watch Tower Society’s branch office in Sweden, dated May 4, 

1982. The letter was a summons to an examination before a 

“judicial committee” consisting of four representatives of the 

Society, who had been appointed, the letter said, to “find out about 

your attitude toward our belief and the organization.” 17 

I realized that my days within the organization now were 

numbered, and that I might not be able to get my treatise ready in 

time for publication. In a letter to the branch office I tried to have 

the meeting with the judicial committee postponed. I pointed out 

that, as they very well knew, the grounds for my “attitude toward 

our belief and the organization” consisted of the evidence I had 

presented against the Society’s chronology, and if they genuinely 

16 The disfellowshipping (excommunication) rules are discussed, for instance, in The 

Watchtower, September 15, 1981, pages 16–31, and in The Watchtower, April 

15,1988, pages 27, 28. With respect to the impending destruction of the present 

world system The Watchtower of September 1, 1989, states on page 19: “Only 

Jehovah’s Witnesses, those of the anointed remnant and the ‘great crowd’, as a 

united organization under the protection of the Supreme Organizer, have an 

Scriptural hope of surviving the impending end of this doomed system dominated 

by Satan, the Devil.” (Compare also The Watchtower, September 15, 1988, pages 

14, 15) 

17 The action was probably taken at the request of the headquarters in Brooklyn, New 

York. As Raymond Franz, who was a member of the Governing Body until Spring, 

1980, wrote to me afterwards in a letter dated August ‘7, 1982: “I suppose it was 

somewhat of a foregone conclusion that the Society would take action toward you. 

In my own case, I feel that it had to be only a matter of time unti1 they did 

something about me, no matter how low a profile I kept. I would not doubt that in 

your case the Branch office contacted Brooklyn and was advised to take action.”


wanted to change my attitude, they had to start with the burden of 

evidence that was the basis for it. I requested, therefore, that the 

members of the committee be allowed to make a thorough 

examination of my treatise. After that we might reasonably have a 

meaningful meeting. 

But neither the branch office nor the four members of the 

judicial committee showed any interest in the kind of discussion I 

had proposed, and they did not even comment on the conditions I 

had stated for having a meaningful meeting with them. In a brief 

letter they just repeated the summons to the committee 

examination. It seemed obvious that I was already judged in 

advance, and that the trial I had been summoned to would only be 

a meaningless and macabre farce. I therefore chose to stay away 

from the examination and was consequently judged and 

disfellowshipped in my absence on June 9, 1982. 

Attempting to gain time I appealed the decision. A so-called 

“appeal committee” of four new members was appointed, and 

once again I repeated in a letter the conditions I found reasonable 

for having a meaningful conversation with them. The letter was not 

even answered. On July 7, 1982, therefore, the new committee met 

for another sham trial in my absence, and as expected it just 

confirmed the decision of the first committee. In both instances 

the sole “judicial” issue considered obviously was, Did I or did I 

not agree totally with Watch Tower teaching? The question of 

whether the reasons for my position were valid was simply treated 

as irrelevant. 

Are the conclusions destructive of faith? 

As pointed out earlier, the conclusions arrived at in this work upset 

the central claims and apocalyptic interpretations of the Watch 

Tower Society. Such conclusions, therefore, could cause some 

unrest among Jehovah’s Witnesses, and the leaders of the Society 

clearly feared that their dissemination would disrupt the unity of 

their flock. I was well aware that my efforts would be interpreted 

by Watch Tower officials as an attempt to destroy faith and to 

disrupt the unity of the “true Christian congregation.” But faith 

should rightly be in harmony with truth, with fact, and this includes 

historical facts. Thus I felt confident that publishing the facts on 

the subject at hand would not disturb peace and unity among those 

who are truly Christians. True unity is founded upon love among 

them, for love is the “perfect bond of union.”— Colossians 3:14. 

On the other hand, there is also a false unity, founded, not upon 

love, but upon fear. Such “unity” is characteristic of authoritarian


organizations, political as well as religious. It is a mechanistic unity 

enforced by the leaders of such organizations who want to 

maintain their authority and keep control over individuals—a unity 

that does not depend on truth. In such organizations, individuals 

relinquish to central authorities their right and responsibility to 

think, speak, and act freely. Since the evidence and the conclusions 

that are presented in this work overthrow the authoritarian claims 

of the Watch Tower Society, the publication of this work may be a 

threat to the enforced unity within this organization. But the true 

unity founded upon love among Christian individuals, whose 

“fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ,” will 

surely not be affected by this.—John 17:21–23; 1 John 1:3, NIV. 

Thus, even if the prophetic claims and interpretations of the 

Watch Tower Society are found to be groundless, nothing of real 

value will be lost when these things dissolve and disappear. A 

Christian still has God’s Word, the real source of truth and hope. 

Christ is still his Lord, his only hope for future life. And he will still 

enjoy Christian peace and unity, with his Father, with Jesus Christ, 

and with those individuals on earth who turn out to be his true 

brothers and sisters. Even if he were to be expelled from an 

authoritarian religious system because he accepts what he clearly 

sees to be true, Christ will not forsake him, for he said: “Where two 

or three come together in my name, there I am with them.” (John 

9:30,34–39; Matthew 18:20, NW) The answer to the question, 

“Where shall we go without the organization?” is still the same as 

at the time of the apostles, when Peter said: “Lord, whom shall we 

go away to? You have sayings of everlasting life.” (John 6:68) It is 

Christ, not an organization, who has “sayings of everlasting life.” 18 

During the years that have passed since this research started, I 

have come to know, personally or by letter, a growing number of 

Jehovah’s Witnesses at different levels of the Watch Tower 

organization who have examined thoroughly the question of 

chronology and independently arrived at the same conclusions that 

are presented in this volume. Some of these men tried very hard to 

defend the Society’s chronology before they were forced by the 

biblical and historical evidence to abandon it. Among such were 

members of the Watch Tower research committee appointed to 

18 In the Watch Tower Society’s comments on this text, the “organization” has been 

substituted for Christ as the one to whom one should go to find “everlasting life.” 

See for example The Watchtower, February 15, 1981, page 19, and December 1, 

1981, page 31.


produce the Society’s Bible dictionary, Aid to Bible Understanding. 

The section on chronology in this work on pages 322 through 348 

is still the most able and thorough discussion of Watch Tower 

chronology ever published by that organization. 19 Yet the 

individual who wrote the article in question ultimately came to 

realize that the Society’s 607 B.C.E. date for the fall of Jerusalem to 

the Babylonians could not be defended, and later he abandoned it 

altogether, with all the calculations and teachings founded upon it. 

In a letter to me, he stated: 

In developing the subject ‘Chronology’ for Aid to Bible 

Understanding, the Neo-Babylonian period, extending from the 

reign of Nebuchadnezzar’s father Nabopolassar to the reign of 

Nabonidus and the fall of Babylon, presented a particular problem. 

As Jehovah’s Witnesses, we were obviously interested in finding 

and presenting some evidence, however small, in support of the 

year 607 B.C.E. as the date of the destruction of Jerusalem in 

Nebuchadnezzar’s eighteenth year. I was well aware of the fact 

that historians consistently point to a time some twenty years later 

and that they place the start of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign in 605 

B.C.E. (his accession year) rather than 625 B.C.E., the date used in 

Watch Tower publications. I knew that the 607 B.C.E. date was 

crucial to the Society’s interpretation of the ‘seven times’ of Daniel 

chapter four as pointing to the year 1914 C.E. 

A large amount of research went into the effort. At that time 

(1968), Charles Ploeger, a member of the Watch Tower 

headquarters staff, was assigned as an assistant to me. He spent 

many weeks searching through the libraries of New York City for 

any sources of information that might give some validity to the 

date of 607 B.C.E. as the time of Jerusalem’s destruction. We also 

went to Brown University to interview Dr. A. J. Sachs, a specialist 

in astronomical texts relating to the Neo-Babylonian and adjoining 

periods. None of these efforts produced any evidence in support 

of the 607 B.C.E. date. 

19 Aid to Bible Understanding was published in its entirety in 1971. A slightly revised 

edition in two volumes was published in 1988. The most important new feature is 

the addition of visual aids (maps, pictures, photographs, etc.), all in full color. The 

name of the dictionary was changed, however, to Insight on the Scriptures, 

evidently because the three principal authors, Raymond Franz, Edward Dunlap, 

and Reinhard Lengtat, left the headquarters in 1980, and that two of them, Franz 

and Dunlap, were disfellowshipped because of their divergent views. In Insight on 

the Scriptures, more than half of the contents of the original article on 

“Chronology” has been cut off (see Vol. 1, pp. 447–467), the reason likely being the 

information on the subject presented in the treatise sent to the headquarters in 

1977, along with a recognition of the tenuous nature of the organization’s claims.


In view of this, in writing the article on ‘Chronology’ I devoted 

a considerable portion of the material to efforts at showing the 

uncertainties existent in ancient historical sources, including not 

only Babylonian sources but also Egyptian, Assyrian and Medo- 

Persian. Though I still believe that a number of the points 

presented as to such uncertainties are valid, I know that the 

argumentation was born of a desire to uphold a date for which 

there was simply no historical evidence. If the historical evidence 

did, in fact, contradict some clear statement in Scripture I would 

not hesitate to hold to the Scriptural account as the more reliable. 

But I realize that the issue is not some contradiction of clear 

Scriptural statement but contradiction of an interpretation placed 

upon portions of Scripture, giving to them a meaning that is not 

stated in the Bible itself. The uncertainties that are to be found in 

such human interpretations are certainly equal to the 

uncertainties to be found in chronological accounts of ancient 

history. 20 

Acknowledgements 

Before this introduction is concluded, I would like to thank the 

many knowledgeable persons all over the world, some of whom 

were still active Jehovah’s Witnesses at the time the treatise was 

written, who, by their encouragement, suggestions, criticism and 

questions have greatly contributed to this treatise. First among 

these I should mention Rud Persson in Ljungbyhed, Sweden, who 

participated in the work from an early stage and who more than 

anyone else assisted in these respects. Other friends of the same 

background, especially James Penton and Raymond Franz, have 

been of great help in preparing the book for publication by 

polishing my English and grammar. 

With respect to the ideo-historical section (chapter one), my 

contacts with Swedish scholar Dr. Ingemar Lindén stimulated my 

interest and initiated my research in this area. Alan Feuerbacher, 

Beaverton, Oregon (now in Fort Collins, Colorado) provided 

important documents for this section. For the chapters on Neo- 

Babylonian chronology (chapters three and four) the contacts with 

authorities on the Babylonian cuneiform texts have been of 

invaluable help. This applies particularly to Professor D. J. 

Wiseman in England, who is a leading expert on the Neo- 

Babylonian period; Mr. C. B. F. Walker, Deputy Keeper in the 

Department of the Ancient Near East in the British Museum, 

20 Raymond Franz, former Governing Body member, wrote this letter, dated June 12, 

1982.


London; Professor Abraham J. Sachs in the U.S.A; Professor 

Hermann Hunger in Austria, who since the death of Abraham 

Sachs in 1983 is the leading expert on Babylonian astronomical 

observational texts; Dr. John M. Steele in Toronto, Canada, and 

Dr. Beatrice André at the Louvre Museum in Paris. On the 

exegetical sections (chapters 5–7), finally, a number of capable 

linguists and Hebraists willingly shared their expertise, especially 

Dr. Seth Erlandsson in Västerås, Sweden; Dr. Tor Magnus Amble 

and Dr. Hans M. Barstad, both in Oslo, Norway, and Professor 

Ernst Jenni in Basel, Switzerland. 

First of all, however, my thanks go to the God of the Bible, who 

in the Old Testament from the time of Moses onwards carries the 

personal name Yahweh or Jehovah, but whom we in the New 

Testament meet and can approach as our heavenly Father, as this 

research has been done under constant prayer for his help and 

understanding. All honor goes to Him, since it is his Word of truth 

that has been the basis of this study. Although certain religious 

theories and interpretations were found to be untenable and had to 

be rejected, his prophetic Word was confirmed, over and over 

again, during the biblical and historical research connected with the 

subject under discussion. This faith-strengthening experience has 

been a real and lasting blessing to me. My hope is that the reader 

will be blessed in a similar way. 

Carl Olof Jonsson 

Göteborg, Sweden, 1982 

Revised in 1998 and 2004

1 

A 

THE HISTORY OF AN 

INTERPRETATION 

LL IDEAS have a beginning. People who believe in an idea, 

however, are often completely unaware of its background, 

origin and development. Ignorance of that history may strengthen 

the conviction that the idea is true, even when it is not. As happens 

in other cases, this ignorance may provide fertile soil for fanaticism. 

True, knowledge of the historical development of an idea does 

not necessarily disprove it, but such knowledge does enable us to 

improve our judgment of its validity. A clear example of an idea— 

in this case, an interpretation — that is obscured by ignorance is a 

widely-held concept concerning the “Gentile times” referred to by 

Christ at Luke 21:24: 

They will fall by the edge of the sword and be taken away as 

captives among all nations; and Jerusalem will be trampled on by 

the Gentiles, until the times of Gentiles are fulfilled.—NRSV. 

Millions of persons internationally have come to accept the 

belief that this prophetic statement definitely points to and is linked 

with a specific date in the twentieth century and they even build 

their present plans and future hopes on that belief. What is its 

history? 

The “year-day principle” 

The length of the period called the “Gentile times” (translated “the 

appointed times of the nations” in the Watch Tower Society’s New 

World Translation) has been calculated by some expositors, including 

the Watch Tower Society, to be 2,520 years. This calculation is 

founded upon the so-called “year-day principle.” According to this 

principle, in biblical time-related prophecies a day always stands for 

23


From the Awake! magazine of October 8, 1973, page 18. 

The calculation of the “times of the Gentiles” as a period 

of 2,520 years, beginning in 607 B.C.E. and ending in 

1914 C.E., is the chronological basis of the apocalyptic 

message preached worldwide by the Watch Tower 

Society. 

a year, “just as on a map one inch may stand for one hundred 

miles.” 1 In the Bible there are two passages where prophetic 

periods are explicitly counted that way: Numbers 14:34 and Ezekiel 

4:6. 

In the first text, as punishment for their errors, the Israelites 

were to wander in the desert for forty years, measured out by the 

number of days the spies had spied out the land, forty days, “a day 

for a year.” 

In the second text Ezekiel was told to lie on his left side for 390 

days and on his right side for 40 days, prophetically carrying the 

errors of Israel and Judah committed during just as many years, “a 

day for a year.” 

It should be noted, however, that these specific interpretations 

are given to us by the Bible itself. “A day for a year” is nowhere stated 

to be a general principle of interpretation that applies also to other 

prophetic periods. 

The development of the concept that the year-day principle can 

indeed apply to any time-related biblical prophecy has a long 

history. The shifting nature of its application during that history 

surely reveals something as to its reliability. 

Its use by Jewish scholars 

1 LeRoy Edwin Froom, The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers (Washington, D.C.: Review 

and Herald Publishing Association, 1948), Vol. II, p. 124. 

24

The History of an Interpretation 25 

Jewish rabbis were the first to begin applying this way of counting 

prophetic time beyond the two references cited, and they did this 

with the “seventy weeks” of Daniel 9:24–27, the first verse of 

which states: “Seventy weeks are decreed for your people and your 

holy city to finish the transgression, to put an end to sin, and to 

atone for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal both 

vision and prophet, and to anoint a most holy place.” 2 

Despite this, the fact is that the “year-day” application was not 

stated as a general principle until the first century C.E., by the rabbi, 

Akibah ben Joseph (c. 50–132 C.E.). 3 

Hundreds of years passed and it was only at the beginning of the 

ninth century that a number of Jewish rabbis began to extend the 

year-day principle to other time periods in the book of Daniel. 

These included the 2,300 “evenings and mornings” of Daniel 8:14, 

and the 1,290 days and 1,335 days of Daniel 12:11, 12, all of which 

were viewed as having Messianic implication. 

The first of these rabbis, Nahawendi, considered the 2,300 

“evenings and mornings” of Daniel 8:14 as years, counting them 

from the destruction of Shiloh (which he dated to 942 B.C.E.) to 

the year 1358 C.E. In that year he expected the Messiah would 

come! 4 

Nahawendi was soon followed by others, such as Saadia ben 

Joseph from the same century and Solomon ben Jeroham from the tenth 

century. The latter applied the year-day principle to the 1,335 days 

of Daniel 12:12. Counting them from the time of Alexander the 

Great, he arrived at the year 968 C.E. as the date for the 

redemption of Israel. 

The famous rabbi, Rashi (1040–1105), ended the 2,300 year-days 

in 1352 C.E., when he thought the Messiah would come. 

2 While this prophecy speaks of weeks, this of itself does not mean that it lends 

itself to an application of the “year-day principle.” To a Jew the Hebrew word for 

“week,” shabû’a, did not always signify a period of seven days as in English. 

Shabû’a literally means a “(period of) seven,” or a “heptad.” The Jews also had a 

“seven” (shabû’a) of years. (Leviticus 25:3, 4, 8, 9) True, when “weeks of years” 

were meant, the word for “years” was usually added. But in the later Hebrew this 

word was often left to be understood as implied. When “weeks of days” were 

meant, the word for “days” could sometimes be appended, as in the other passage 

in Daniel where shabû’a is found. (10:2, 3) Daniel 9:24, therefore, simply asserts 

that “seventy sevens are determined,” and from the context (the allusion to the 

“seventy years” in verse 2) it may be concluded that “seventy sevens of years” are 

intended. It is because of this apparent textual connection—and not because of 

any “year-day principle”—that some translations (Moffatt, Goodspeed, AT, RS) read 

“seventy weeks of years” in Daniel 9:24. 

3 Froom, Vol. II, pp. 195, 196. 

4 Ibid., p. 196. Nahawendi also counted the 1,290 days of Daniel 12:11 as a period 

of years, beginning with the destruction of the second temple [70 C.E.] and 

thereby arriving at the same date, 1358 C.E. 

25


Abraham bar Hiyya Hanasi (c. 1065–1136) speculated that the 

2,300-, the 1,290- and the 1,335-year periods would terminate on 

different dates in the fifteenth century. The end of the 2,300 yeardays, 

for instance, was set at 1468 C.E . 5 

Even up into the nineteenth century, many other Jewish 

scholars were continuing to use the year-day principle to fix dates 

for the coming of the Messiah. 

The methods the rabbinical scholars used in applying the yearday 

principle during those ten centuries were varied and the dates 

they arrived at differed. Whatever method employed, however, one 

thing was true: all the end-dates eventually proved empty of 

fulfillment. 

Since the use of the year-day principle was relatively common 

among Jewish sources from early centuries, was this also the case 

among Christian Bible expositors? 

Of greater interest, does the history of its use within the 

Christian community—and the results obtained—demonstrate a 

contrast, or does it follow a similar pattern? What has been its 

fruitage? 

The “year-day principle” among Christian expositors 

As we have seen, rabbi Akibah ben Joseph had presented the yearday 

method as a principle back in the first century C.E. We find no 

application of it—in that way, as a principle—among Christian 

scholars, however, for the following one thousand years. 

True, several expositors from the fourth century onward 

suggested a mystical or symbolic meaning for the 1,260 days of 

Revelation, yet before the twelfth century they never applied the 

year-day rule to those days, nor to any other time period, with the 

sole exception of the 3 1/2 days of Revelation 11:9. That period 

was interpreted to be 3 1/2 years by a number of expositors, the 

first of whom was Victorinus in the fourth century. 6 This, of course, 

was far from holding to a year-day rule or principle. 

Joachim of Floris (c. 1130–1202), abbot of the Cistercian 

monastery in Corace, Italy, was most probably the first Christian 

expositor to apply the year-day principle to the different time 

periods of Daniel and Revelation. This was pointed out during the 

19th century by Charles Maitland, a leading opponent of the idea, in 

a number of works and articles. For example, in refuting those 

holding that 

5 Ibid., pp. 201, 210, 211. 

6 E. B. Elliott, Honae Apocalypticae, 3rd ed. (London, 1847), Vol. III, pp. 233–240. 

26


the 1,260 days of Revelation 11:3 were 1,260 years, Maitland 

concluded, after a thorough investigation, that the system of the 

1260 years “was never heard of till dreamed into the world by a 

wild Abbot in 1190.” 7 

Though many nineteenth-century adherents of the year-day 

principle tried to refute Maitland’s statement concerning the 

novelty of the principle, all their attempts proved unsuccessful. 

After a very thorough examination of all available sources, even the 

most learned of his opponents, the Reverend E. B. Elliott, had to 

admit that “for the first four centuries, the days mentioned in Daniel’s 

and Apocalyptic prophecies respecting Antichrist were interpreted 

literally as days, not as years, by the Fathers of the Christian 

Church.” 8 He thus had to agree with Maitland that Joachim of 

Floris was the first Christian writer to apply the year-day principle 

to the 1,260 days of Revelation 11:3 stating: 

At the close of the 12th century Joachim Abbas, as we have just 

seen, made a first and rude attempt at it: and in the 14th, the 

Wycliffite Walter Brute followed. 9 

Joachim, who was probably influenced by Jewish rabbis, 

counted the 1,260 “year-days” from the time of Christ and believed 

that they would soon end in an “age of the Spirit.” Although he did 

not fix a specific date for this, it seems that he looked forward to 

the year 1260 C.E. After his death, that year came “to be 

considered by Joachim’s followers as the fatal date that would 

begin the new age, so much so that when it passed without any 

notable event some ceased to believe any of his teachings.” 10 

Joachim’s works initiated a new tradition of interpretation, a 

tradition in which the “year-day principle” was the very basis of 

7 Charles Maitland, The Apostles’ School of Prophetic Interpretation (London, 1849), 

pp. 37, 38 

8 E. B. Elliott, Horae Apocalypticae, 3rd ed. (London, 1847), Vol. HI, p. 233. 

9 Ibid., p. 240. The late Dr. LeRoy Edwin Froom, who was a modern defender of the 

year-day theory, arrived at a similar conclusion in his massive four-volume work, 

The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers. In Volume I (1950) on page 700, he states: 

“Heretofore, for thirteen centuries the seventy weeks had been recognized generally 

as weeks of years. But the first thousand years of the Christian Era did not 

produce any further applications of the principle, among Christian writers, save 

one or two glimpses of the ‘ten days’ of Revelation 2:10 as ten years of persecution, 

and the three and a half days of Revelation 11 as three and a half years. But now 

Joachim for the first time applied the year-day principle to the 1260-day prophecy.’ 

10 Froom, Vol. I, p. 716. 

27


prophetic interpretations. During the following centuries 

innumerable dates were fixed for Christ’s second advent, most of 

them built upon the year-day principle. At the time of the 

Reformation (in the sixteenth century), Martin Luther and most of 

the other reformers believed in that principle, and it was largely 

accepted among Protestant scholars far into the nineteenth century. 

The principle applied to the Gentile times 

As we have seen, Joachim of Floris applied the year-day principle 

to the 1,260 days of Revelation 11:3. The preceding verse converts 

this period into months, stating that “the nations . . . will trample 

the holy city underfoot for forty-two months.” (Revelation 11:2, 

NW) Since this prediction about the “holy city” closely parallels 

Jesus’ words at Luke 21:24 that “Jerusalem will be trampled under 

foot by the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled” 

(NASB), some of Joachim’s followers soon began to associate the 

“times of the Gentiles” with this calculated period in which the 

1,260 days became 1,260 years. 

However, because they believed that Revelation 11:2, 3 and 12:6, 

14 dealt with the Christian church, Jerusalem or the “holy city” 

usually was interpreted to mean the church of Rome. 11 The period 

of the “times of the Gentiles,” therefore, was thought to be the 

period of the affliction of the church, the end of which affliction 

was originally expected in 1260 C.E. 

Others, however, believed the “holy city” to be the literal city of 

Jerusalem. The well known scholastic physician, Arnold of Villanova 

(c. 1235–1313), identified the Gentile times with the 1,290 days of 

Daniel 12:11, converting them from 1290 days to 1290 years. 

Counting these from the taking away of the Jewish sacrifices after 

the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 C.E., he 

expected the end of the Gentile times in the fourteenth century. 

The Crusades were still being waged in his day and Arnold linked 

them with the hoped-for expiration of the Gentile times in the near 

future, arguing that, unless the end of the times of the Gentiles was 

near, how could the “faithful people” regain the Holy Land from 

11 Ibid., pp. 717, 723, 726, 727. The information here is based on the work De 

Seminibus Scripturarum, fol. 13v, col. 2 (as discussed in Froom), which was 

written in 1205 A.D. The manuscript is known as Vat. Latin 3813. 

28


the unbelievers? 12 

At the end of the fourteenth century, Walter Brute, one of John 

Wycliffe’s followers in England offered yet another interpretation. 

According to him, the “times of the Gentiles” were the period 

when the Christian church was dominated by heathen rites and 

customs. This apostasy, he held, started after the death of the last 

apostle in about 100 C.E. and would continue for 1,260 years. This 

period, and also the 1,290 “year-days,” which he reckoned from the 

destruction of Jerusalem 30 years earlier (in 70 C.E.), had already 

expired in his days. He wrote: 

Now if any man will behold the Chronicles, he shall find, that 

after the destruction of Jerusalem was accomplished, and after the 

strong hand of the holy people was fully dispersed, and after the 

placing of the abomination; that is to say, the Idol of Desolation of 

Jerusalem, within the Holy place, where the Temple of God was 

before, there had passed 1290 days, taking a day for a year, as 

commonly it is taken in the Prophets. And the times of the 

Heathen people are fulfilled, after whose Rites and Customs God 

suffered the holy City to be trampled under foot for forty and two 

months. 13 

Since the times of the Gentiles already had expired according to 

his calculations, Brute thought that the second coming of Christ 

must be right at hand. 

Constantly changing dates 

Time passed and left the many apocalyptic fixed dates behind, the 

predictions tied to them remaining unfulfilled. By now, counting 

the 1,260 or 1,290 years from the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 

C.E., or from the death of the apostles could no longer produce 

meaningful results. So, the starting point had to be moved forward to 

a later date. 

Groups persecuted and branded as heretics by the Roman 

church soon began to identify the ‘trampling Gentiles’ with the 

papacy of Rome. These persecuted groups commonly viewed 

themselves as “the true church”—pictured in Revelation 12 as a 

woman who had to flee into “the wilderness” for “a thousand two 

12 Arnold of Villanova, Tractatus de Tempore Adventus Antichristi (”Treatise on the 

Time of the Coming of Antichrist”), part 2 (1300); reprinted in Heinrich Finke, Aus 

den Tagen Bonifaz VIII (Munster in W., 1902), pp. CXLVIII–CLI, CXLVII. (See also 

Froom, Vol. I, pp. 753–756.) 

13 From Registrum Johannis Trefnant, Episcopi Herefordensis (containing the 

proceedings of the trial of Walter Brute for heresy), as translated in John Foxe, 

Acts and Monuments, 9th ed. (London, 1684), Vol. I, p. 547. (See also Froom, Vol. 

II, p. 80.) 

29


hundred and sixty days,” the period of trampling spiritual 

Jerusalem. (Revelation 12:6,14) This view now allowed them to 

advance the starting-point from the first century to a time somewhere 

in the fourth century, with its growth of authority on the part of the 

Roman church. 

This “adjusted” view was very common among the Reformers. 

John Napier (1550–1617), the distinguished Scottish mathematician 

and student of prophecy, began the period about 300 or 316 C.E., 

and came up with the end of the Gentile times in the latter half of 

the sixteenth century. 14 

More time passed and the starting-point was once again moved 

forward, this time into the sixth or seventh centuries, the period 

when the popes had reached a real position of power. George Bell, 

for example, writing in the London Evangelical Magazine of 1796, 

counted the 1260 years from either 537 or 553 C.E., and predicted 

the fall of Antichrist (the Pope) in “1797, or 1813. 15 Of the 1,260 

years Bell says: 

The holy city is to be trodden under foot by the Gentiles, or 

Papists, who, though they are Christians in name, are Gentiles in 

worship and practice; worshipping angels, saints, and images, and 

persecuting the followers of Christ. These Gentiles take away the 

daily sacrifice, and set up the abomination that maketh the visible 

church of Christ desolate for the space of 1260 years. 16 

This was written in 1795 in the midst of the French Revolution. 

Shortly afterward the Pope was taken captive by French troops and 

forced into exile (in February, 1798). Very interestingly, these 

startling events in France and Italy had to some extent been 

“predicted” nearly a century in advance by several expositors, the 

best known of whom was the Scottish pastor, Robert Fleming, Jr. (c. 

1660–1716). 17 Surely, many felt, these major historical events had 

confirmed the rightness of their predictions! Because of this, the 

year 1798 was very soon quite commonly held among biblical 

commentators to be the terminal date for the 1,260 years. 

This view—with some minor differences—was also adopted by 

Charles Taze Russell and his followers. And it is still prevalent 

among the Seventh-Day Adventists. 

14 John Napier, A Plaine Discovery of the Whole Revelation of Saint John (Edinburgh, 

1593), pp. 64, 65. (See Froom, Vol. II, p. 458.) 

15 G. Bell, “Downfall of Antichrist,” Evangelical Magazine (London), 1796, Vol. 4, p. 

54. (See Froom, Vol. 2,p. 742.) Although published in 1796, the article was written 

July 24,1795. 

16 G. Bell, ibid., p. 57. (See Froom, Vol. II, p. 742.) 

17 Robert Fleming, Jr., The Rise and Fall of Papacy (London, 1701),p. 68. (For 

additional notes on this prediction, see Chapter 6, section D: “1914 in 

perspective.”) 

30


Political and social upheaval fuels prophetic 

speculations 

The French Revolution of 1789–1799 had extraordinary impact 

extending far beyond French borders. Following the violent 

removal of the French monarchy and the proclamation of the 

Republic in 1792, new extremist leaders not only brought about a 

period of terror and chaos in France itself, but they inaugurated an 

almost unbroken period of wars of conquest, which lasted until 

1815, when Emperor Napoleon I was defeated at Waterloo. The 

Revolution’s chaotic aftermath in Europe and other parts of the 

world excited intensified interest in prophetic study, especially as 

some of these upheavals had been partially predicted by expositors 

of the prophecies. 

Historians recognize the French Revolution as marking a major 

turning-point in world history. It brought to an end a long era of 

relative stability in Europe, uprooting the established order and 

deeply changing political and religious thought. 

Comparing the wars of the French Revolution and Napoleon 

Bonaparte with the earlier Thirty Years’ War (1618–1648) and the 

later World War I (1914–1918), historian Robert Gilpin says of 

these three wars that “each was a world war involving almost all the 

states in the [international] system and, at least in retrospect, can be 

considered as having constituted a major turning point in human 

history .” 18 

Another well-known historian, R. R. Palmer, in discussing the 

momentous role of the French Revolution in modern history, says: 

Even today in the middle of the twentieth century, despite all 

that has happened in the lifetime of men not yet old, and even . . . 

in America or in any other part of a world in which the countries 

of Europe no longer enjoy their former commanding position, it is 

still possible to say that the French Revolution at the end of the eighteenth 

century was the turning point of modern civilization. 19 

The resultant uprooting of long-standing European political and 

social institutions caused many to believe that they were indeed 

living in the last days. Men of many backgrounds—ministers, 

politicians, lawyers, and laymen—became involved in prophetic 

18 Professor Robert Gilpin, “The Theory of Hegemonic War,” The Journal of 

Interdisciplinary History, (published in Cambridge, MA, and London, England), Vol. 

18:4, Spring 1988, p. 606. (Emphasis added.) 

19 R. R. Palmer in his foreword to Georges Lefebvre’s The Coming of the , French 

Revolution (New York: Vintage, 1947), p. v. 

31


study. A voluminous body of literature on the prophecies was 

produced, numerous prophetic periodicals were started, and 

prophetic conferences were held on both sides of the Atlantic. 

The apocalyptic revival commenced in England, but soon 

spread to the European Continent and the United States of 

America where, in the latter case, it culminated in the well-known 

Millerite movement. Based on interpretations of Daniel 8:14, the 

predictions now developed generally pointed to 1843, 1844, or 

1847 as the time for Christ’s second advent. 

It was in this feverish atmosphere that a new interpretation of 

the Gentile times was born, in which, for the first time, the oft-used 

figure of 1,260 years was doubled to 2,520 years. 

The chart presented on the facing page shows the results that 

the “year-day” method of counting prophetic time-periods 

produced over a period of seven centuries. Though almost all of 

the thirty-six scholars and prophetic expositors listed were working 

from the same basic Scriptural text referring to 1,260 days, very 

rarely did they agree on the same starting and ending points for the 

period’s fulfillment. The ending dates for the Gentile times set by 

them or their followers ran all the way from 1260 C.E. to 2016 

C.E. Yet all of them advanced what to them were cogent reasons 

for arriving at their dates. What results now came from the 

doubling of this figure in connection with Jesus’ statement about 

the “Gentile times”? 

John Aquila Brown 

In the long history of prophetic speculation, John Aquila Brown in 

England plays a notable role. Although no biographical data on 

Brown has been found so far, he strongly influenced the 

apocalyptic thinking of his time. He was the first expositor who 

applied the supposed 2,300 year-days of Daniel 8:14 so that they 

ended in 1843 (later 1844). 20 This became a key date of the Second 

Advent movement. 21 He was also the first who arrived at a 

prophetic time period of 2,520 years. Brown’s calculation of 2,520 

years was based on his exposition of the “seven times” contained 

20 Brown first published his chronology in an article in the London monthly The 

Christian Observer of November 1810. According to his understanding of the 

Gentile times, the “trampling Gentiles” were the Mohammedans (or Muslims), and 

he therefore regarded the 1,260 years so widely commented on as Mohammedan 

lunar years, corresponding to 1,222 solar years. He reckoned this period from 622 

C.E. (the first year of the Mohammedan Hegira era) to 1844, when he expected the 

coming of Christ and the restoration of the Jewish nation in Palestine.—J. A. 

Brown, The Even-Tide, Vol. 1 (1823), pp. vii, xi, 1–60. 

32


TABLE 1: THE MULTIPLE, SHIFTING APPLICATIONS 

OF THE 1,260 YEARS 

Expositor Publication Application Remarks 

date (all dates C.E.) 

Joachim of Floris 1195 1–1260 

Arnold of Villanova 

Walter Brute 

1300 

1393 

c. 74–1364 

134–1394 

Gentile Times=1290 years 

Martin Luther 1530 38–1328 Gentile times =1290 years 

A. Osiander 1545 412–1672 

J.Funck 1558 261–1521 

G. Nigrinus 1570 441–1701 

Aretius 1573 312–1572 

John Napier 1593 316–1576 

D. Pareus 1618 606–1866 

J. Tillinghast 1655 396–1656 

J. Artopaeus 1665 260–1520 

Cocceius 1669 292–1552 

T. Beverley 1684 437–1697 

P. Jurieu 1687 454–1714 

R. Fleming, Jr. 1701 552–1794 1260 years of 360 days 

″ ″ 1701 606–1848 = 1242 Julian years 

William Whiston 1706 606–1866 

Daubuz 1720 476–1736 

J. Ph. Petri 1768 587–1847 

Lowman 1770 756–2016 

John Gill 1776 606–1866 

Hans Wood 1787 620–1880 

J. Bicheno 1793 593–1789 

A. Fraser 1795 756–1998 1242 Julian years 

George Bell 1796 537–1797 

″ ″ 1796 553–1813 

Edward King 1798 538–1798 

Galloway 1802 606–1849 1242 Julian years 

W. Hales 1803 620–1880 

G. S. Faber 1806 606–1866 

W. Cuninghame 1813 533–1792 

J. H. Frere 1815 533–1792 

Lewis Way 1818 531–1791 

W. C. Davis 1818 588–1848 

J. Bayford 1820 529–1789 

John Fry 1822 537–1797 

John Aquila Brown 1823 622–1844 1260 lunar years 

The table shows a sample of the many different applications of the 1,260 

and 1,290 “year-days” from Joachim of Floris in 1195 to John Aquila 

Brown in 1823. It would have been easy to extend the table to include 

expositors after Brown. However, the table ends with him because at this 

time another interpretation of the Gentile times began to surface, in 

which the 1,260 years were doubled to 2,520 years. 

33


John Aquila Brown’s book The Even-Tide (London, 1823), in which the 

“seven times” of Daniel 4 for the first time were explained to mean 

2,520 years. 

34


in Nebuchadnezzar’s dream of the chopped-down tree in Daniel, 

chapter 4. It was first published in 1823 in his two-volume work 

The Even-Tide; or, Last Triumph of the Blessed and Only Potentate, the King 

of Kings, and Lord of Lords. 22 

He specifically states that he was the first to write on the subject: 

Although many large and learned volumes have been written on 

prophetical subjects during a succession of ages; yet, having never 

seen the subject, on which I am about to offer some remarks, touched 

upon by any author, I commend it to the attention of the reader, not 

doubtingly, indeed, but with strong confidence that it will be 

found still further to corroborate the scale of the prophetical 

periods, assumed as the basis of the fulfillment of prophecy. 23 

In his interpretation, Brown differed from other later expositors 

in that he nowhere connects the “seven times” of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s dream with the “seven times” of prophetic 

punishment directed against Israel at Leviticus 26:12–28. 

“Nebuchadnezzar was a type,” Brown wrote, “of the three 

successive kingdoms which were to arise.” Of the “seven times,” or 

years, of Nebuchadnezzar’s affliction, he said: 

21 The second advent was expected to occur during the year 1843/44, counted from 

Spring to Spring as was done in the Jewish calendar. It has been maintained that 

expositors in the United States arrived at the 1843 date as the end of the 2,300 

years independently of Brown. Although that may be true, it cannot be proved, and 

interestingly, the London, England, Christian Observer, a periodical founded in 

1802 which frequently dealt with prophecy, also had an American edition 

published at Boston which ran article for article with the British edition. So 

Brown’s article on the 2,300 years could have been read by many in the United 

States as early as 1810. Soon afterwards, the 1843 date began to appear in 

American prophetic expositions. 

22 Published in London; the pertinent material is found in Vol. II, pp. 130–152. 

23 Perhaps some may be inclined to object to this statement on account of the table 

on pages 404 and 405 of Froom’s The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, Volume IV. It 

is true that this table seems to show James Hatley Frere as the first to write on the 

2,520 years in 1813. But the part of the table farthest to the right on page 405 

entitled, “Dating of other time periods,” does not have any close connection with 

the “Publication date” column on page 404. It simply states the author’s general 

position on other time periods. Besides, Frere never held the times of the Gentiles 

(or the “seven times”) to be a period of 2,520 years. In his first book on prophecy, A 

Combined View of the Prophecies of Daniel, Esdras, and St. John (London, 1815), he 

does not comment on Daniel 4 or Luke 21:24. The “holy city” of Revelation 11:2 he 

explains to be “the visible church of Christ” and “during the period of 1260 years, 

the whole of this city is trodden under foot of the Gentiles, excepting the interior 

courts of its temple.” (Page 87) Many years later Frere calculated the Gentile times 

to be a period of 2,450 years from 603 B .C.E. to 1847 C.E. See, for example, his 

book, The Great Continental Revolution, Marking the Expiration of the Times of the 

Gentiles AD. 1847–8 (London, 1848). Note especially pages 66–78. John A. Brown, 

of course, was well acquainted with the many contemporary writings on prophecy, 

and Frere was one of the best known expositors in England. So there seems to be 

no reason to doubt Brown’s own statement of priority with respect to the 2,520 

years. 

35


[These] would, therefore, be considered as a grand week of 

years, forming a period of two thousand five hundred and twenty 

years, and embracing the duration of the four tyrannical 

monarchies; at the close of which they are to learn, like 

Nebuchadnezzar, by the “season and time” of the two judgements, 

that “the Most High ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to 

whomsoever he will.” 

Brown calculated the 2,520 years as running from the first year 

of Nebuchadnezzar, 604 B.C.E., to the year 1917, when “the full 

glory of the kingdom of Israel shall be perfected.” 24 

Brown did not himself associate this period with the Gentile 

times of Luke 21:24. Nonetheless his calculation for the 2,520 

years, and his having based these on Daniel chapter 4, have since 

played a key role in certain modern interpretations of those Gentile 

times. 

The 2,520 years linked with the Gentile times 

It was not long before other expositors began identifying the new 

calculation of 2,520 years with the “Gentile times” of Luke 21:24. 

But, even as with the 1,260 days, they came up with differing 

results. 

At the Albury Park Prophetic Conferences (held annually at Albury 

near Guildford, south of London, England from 1826 to 1830), the 

“times of the Gentiles” was one of the topics considered. Right 

from the first discussions in 1826 they were connected with the 

2,520 year period by William Cuninghame. He chose as his starting 

point the year when the ten tribes were carried into captivity by 

Shalmaneser (which he dated to 728 B.C.E.), thus arriving at 1792 

C.E. as their last or termination date, a date that by then was 

already in the past? 25 

Many biblical commentators counted the “seven times of the 

Gentiles” from the captivity of Manasseh, which they dated to 677 

B .C.E. This was obviously done so that the Gentile times would 

24 The Even-Tide, Vol. II, pp. 134, 135; Vol. I, pp. XLIII, XLIV. 

25 Henry Drummond, Dialogues on Prophecy (London, 1827), Vol. I, pp. 33, 34. In this 

report from the discussions at Albury, the participants are given fictitious names. 

Cuninghame (”Sophron”) arrives at the 2,520 years by doubling the 1,260 years, 

not by referring to the “seven times” of Daniel 4 or Leviticus 26. In support of this 

he refers to the authority of Joseph Mede, an expositor living in the seventeenth 

century. Although Mede had suggested that the times of the Gentiles might refer to 

the four kingdoms beginning with Babylon, he never stated the period to be 2,520 

years. (Mede, The Works, London, 1664, Book 4, pp. 908–910, 920.) In a later 

conversation “Anastasius” (Henry Drummond) connects the 2,520 years with the 

“seven times” of Leviticus 26 and, “correcting” the starting-point of Cuninghame 

from 728 to 722 B .C., he arrives at 1798 C.E. as the terminal date. (Dialogues, 

Vol. I, pp. 324, 325) 

36


Above: The Albury Park residence, near Guildford, south of London, the 

place of the Albury Park Prophetic Conferences, 1826–1830. At these 

conferences certain ideas were developed that 50 years later were to 

become central parts of the message of the Watch Tower Society, viz., 

the Gentile times as a period of 2,520 years, and the idea of Christ’s second coming 

as an invisible presence. 

Below: Henry Drummond, owner of Albury Park and host of the 

conferences, who also published annual reports on the discussions 

(Dialogues on Prophecy). 

37


end at the same time already being assigned to the 2,300 day-years, 

that is, in 1843 or 1844. 26 In 1835, William W. Pym published his 

work, A Word of Warning in the Last Days, in which he ended the 

“seven times” in 1847. Interestingly, he builds his calculation of the 

2,520 years of Gentile times on the “seven times” mentioned in 

Leviticus 26 as well as the “seven times” of Daniel 4: 

In other words, the judgements threatened by Moses, which 

should last during the seven times , or 2520 years; and the 

judgements revealed to Daniel, which should come to an end by 

the cleansing of the sanctuary after a portion of the greater number 

2520. 27 

Others, however, were looking forward to the year 1836 C.E., a 

year fixed on entirely different grounds by the German theologian 

J. A. Bengel (1687–1752), and they tried to end the “seven times” in 

that same year. 28 

Illustrating the state of flux existing, Edward Bickersteth (1786- 

1850), evangelical rector of Watton, Hartfordshire, tried different 

starting-points for the “seven times of the Gentiles,” coming up 

with three different ending dates: 

If we reckon the captivity of Israel as commencing in 727 

before Christ, Israel’s first captivity under Salmanezer, it would 

terminate in 1793, when the French revolution broke out: and if 

677 before Christ, their captivity under Esarhaddon (the same 

period when Manasseh , king of Judah, was carried into captivity,) 

(2 Kings xvii. 23, 24.2 Chron. xxxiii. 11,) it would terminate in 

1843: or, if reckoned from 602 before Christ, which was the final 

dethronement of Jehoiakim by Nebuchadnezzar, it would 

terminate in 1918. All these periods may have a reference to 

corresponding events at their termination, and are worthy of 

serious attention. 29 

One of the best known and most learned millenarians of the 

19th century was Edward Bishop Elliott (1793–1875), incumbent of 

St. Mark’s Church in Brighton, England. With him, the date of 

1914 first receives mention. In his monumental treatise Horae 

Apocalypticae (”Hours with the Apocalypse”) he first reckoned the 

2,520 years from 727 B.C.E. to 1793 C.E., but added: 

26 John Fry (1775–1849) was among those doing this, in his Unfulfilled Prophecies of 

Scripture, published in 1835. 

27 Found on page 48 of his work. Quoted in Froom, Vol. Ill, p. 576. 

28 So did W. A. Holmes, chancellor of Cashel, in his book The Time of the End which 

was published in 1833. He dated the captivity of Manasseh under Esarhaddon to 

685 B CE., and counting the 2,520 years from that year, he ended the “seven 

times” in 1835–1836. 

29 Edward Bickersteth, A Scripture Help, first edited in 1815. After 1832 Bickersteth 

began to preach on the prophecies , which also influenced later editions of A 

Scripture Help. The quotation is taken from the 20th edition (London, 1850), p. 

235. 

38


Of course if calculated from Nebuchadnezzar’s own accession 

and invasion of Judah, B.C. 606, the end is much later, being A.D. 

1914; just one half century, or jubilean period, from our probable 

date of the opening of the Millennium [which he had fixed to 

“about A.D.1862”]. 30 

One factor that should be noted here is that in Elliott’s 

chronology 606 B.C.E. was the accession-year of Nebuchadnezzar, 

while in the later chronology of Nelson H. Barbour and Charles T. 

Russell 606 B.C.E. was the date assigned for Nebuchadnezzar’s 

destruction of Jerusalem in his 18th year. 

The Millerite movement 

The leading British works on prophecy were extensively reprinted 

in the United States and strongly influenced many American 

writers on the subject. These included the well-known Baptist 

preacher William Miller and his associates, who pointed forward to 

1843 as the date of Christ’s second coming. It is estimated that at 

least 50,000, and perhaps as many as 200,000 people eventually 

embraced Miller’s views. 31 

Virtually every position they held on the different prophecies 

had been taught by other past or contemporary expositors. Miller 

was simply following others in ending the “Gentile times” in 1843. 

At the First General Conference held in Boston, Massachusetts, on 

October 14 and 15, 1840, one of Miller’s addresses dealt with 

Biblical chronology. He placed the “seven times,” or 2,520 years, as 

extending from 677 B.CE. to 1843 CE. 32 The second coming of 

Christ was expected no later than 1844. 

The date predicted for so long and by so many, with claimed 

Biblical backing, came and went, with nothing to fulfill the 

expectations based on it. 

After the “Great Disappointment” of 1844, some, and among 

them Miller himself, openly confessed that the time was a 

mistake. 33 Others, however, insisted that the time itself was right, 

30 E.B. Elliott, Horae Apocalypticae, lst ed. (London: Seeley, Bumside, and Seeley, 

1844),Vol. III, pp. 1429–1431. Elliott’s work ran through five editions (1844,1846, 

1847,1851, and 1862).In the last two he did not directly mention the 1914 date, 

although he still suggested that the 2,520 years might be reckoned from the 

beginning of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign. 

31 David Tallmadge Arthur, “Come out of Babylon”: A Study of Millerite Separatism and 

Denominationalism, 1840–1865 (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of 

Rochester, 1970), pp. 86–88. 

32 William Miller, “A Dissertation on Prophetic Chronology” in The First Report of the 

General Conference of Christians Expecting the Advent of the Lord Jesus Christ 

(Boston, 1842), p. 5. Other Millerites who stressed the 2,520 years included 

Richard Hutchinson (editor of The Voice of Elijah) in an 1843 pamphlet, The Throne 

of Judah Perpetuated in Christ, and Philemon R. Russell (editor of the Christian 

Herald and Journal) in the March 19, 1840 issue of that periodical. The 2,520 

years also appear on charts used by Millerite evangelists. (See Froom, Vol. IV, pp. 

699–701, 726–737.) 

39


E. B. Elliott’s Horae Apocalypticae, Vol. III (1844) 

E. B. Elliott was most probably the first expositor to reckon the 

“times of the Gentiles” from 606 B.C.E. to 1914 CE. It should be 

noted, however, that in his chronology the starting-point, 606 B.C.E, 

was the accession-year of Nebuchadnezzar, while in the chronology of 

Barbour and Russell this was Nebuchadnezzar’s eighteenth year. Their 

chronologies, therefore, were conflicting, although the dates 

accidentally happened to be the same. 

40


The “1843” chart 

used by William Miller (inset) and his associates in presenting the 

1843 message. Miller presented fifteen separate “proofs” in support 

of his 1843 date, most of which were calculations based on the 

various year-day periods, including the 2300 and 2520 year-days. 

41


but the event anticipated was wrong. Expressing what has become 

a familiar justification, they had expected “the wrong thing at the 

right time.” 

This position was taken by a group which later came to be 

known as the Seventh-Day Adventists. They declared that Jesus, 

instead of descending to earth in 1844, entered the most holy place 

of the heavenly sanctuary as mankind’s great high priest to 

introduce the antitypical atonement day. 34 This group, which 

separated from the rest of the “Second Adventists” in the end of 

the 1840’s, caused the first major division within the original 

movement. 

Some leading Millerites who also held to the 1844 date—among 

them Apollos Hale, Joseph Turner, Samuel Snow, and Barnett Matthias— 

claimed that Jesus had indeed come as the Bridegroom in 1844, 

although spiritually and invisibly, “not in personally descending 

from heaven, but taking the throne spiritually.” In 1844, they declared, 

the “kingdom of this world” had been given to Christ. 35 

Offshoots of the Millerite movement 

Thus, following 1844, the Millerite “Second Advent” movement 

gradually broke into several Adventist groups. 36 A proliferation of 

new dates began to appear: 1845, 1846, 1847, 1850, 1851, 1852, 

1853, 1854, 1866, 1867, 1868, 1870, 1873, 1875, and so on, and 

these dates, each having their promoters and adherents, 

contributed to even greater fragmentation. A leading Second 

Adventist, Jonathan Cummings, declared in 1852 that he had received 

33 “That I have been mistaken in the time, I freely confess; and I have no desire to 

defend my course any further than I have been actuated by pure motives, and it 

has resulted in God’s glory. My mistakes and errors God, I trust, will forgive . . . .” 

(Wm. Miller’s Apology and Defence, Boston, 1845, pp. 33, 34.) George Storrs, who 

had been one of the leaders in the last stage of the Millerite movement, the socalled 

“seventh month movement,” in which the advent had been finally fixed to 

October 22, 1844, was even more outspoken. Not only did he openly and 

repeatedly confess and regret his error, but he also declared that God had not been 

in the “definite time” movement, that they had been “mesmerized” by mere human 

influence, and that “the Bible did not teach definite time at all” (See D. T. Arthur, 

op. cit., pp. 89–92.) 

34 For a clarifying discussion of the development of this doctrine, see Dr. Ingemar 

Linden, The Last Trump. A historico-genetical study of some important chapters in 

the making and development of the Seventh-Day Adventist Church (Frankfurt am 

Main, Bern, Las Vegas: Peter Lang, 1978), pp. 129–133. Years later the doctrine 

was changed to mean that the so-called “investigative judgment” of the believers— 

dead and living—began on October 22, 1844. 

35 Froom, Vol. IV, p. 888. A detailed discussion of these views is given by Dr. D. T. 

Arthur, op. cit., pp. 97–115. 

36 In 1855 a prominent Second Adventist, J. P. Cowles, estimated that there existed 

“some twenty-five divisions of what was once the one Advent body. (See D. T. 

Arthur, op. cit., p. 319.) 

42


a “new light” on the chronology, and that the second advent was to 

be expected in 1854. Many Millerites joined Cummings, and in 

January, 1854, they started a new periodical, the World’s Crisis, in 

advocacy of the new date. 37 

Other factors besides dates began to play a role in the 

composition of the Second Advent movement. Right up to the 

present time they appear as distinctive features among a number of 

movements that developed from Second Adventism, including the 

Seventh-Day Adventist Church, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and certain 

Church of God denominations. These factors included the 

doctrine of conditional—not inherent—immortality of the soul, 

with its corollary tenet that the ultimate destiny of those who are 

rejected by God is destruction or annihilation, not conscious 

torment. The trinitarian belief also became an issue among some 

sectors of the Second Adventists. (For further details on these 

developments and their effect in contributing to division among 

the offshoots of the Millerite movements, see the Appendix for 

Chapter One.) 

Most of these developments had already taken place by the time 

that Charles Taze Russell, still in his teenage years, began the 

formation of a Bible study group in Allegheny, Pennsylvania. From 

the end of the 1860’s onward, Russell increasingly got into touch 

with some of the Second Adventist groups which developed. He 

established close connections with certain of their ministers and 

read some of their papers, including George Storrs’ Bible Examiner. 

Gradually, he and his associates took over many of their central 

teachings, including their conditionalist and anti-trinitarian 

positions and most of their “age to come” views. Finally, in 1876, 

Russell also adopted a revised version of their chronological 

system, which implied that the 2,520 years of Gentile times would 

expire in 1914. In all essential respects, therefore, Russell’s Bible 

Student movement may be described as yet another offshoot of the 

Millerite movement. 

What, then, was the most direct source of the chronological 

system that Russell, the founder of the Watch Tower movement, 

adopted, including not only the 2,520 year-period for the Gentile 

times, its ending in 1914, but also the year 1874 for the start of an 

invisible presence by Christ? That source was a man named Nelson 

H. Barbour. 

Nelson H. Barbour 

37 Isaac C. Wellcome, History of the Second Advent Message (Yarmouth, Maine, 

Boston, New York, London, 1874), pp. 594–597. 

43


Nelson H. Barbour was born near Auburn, New York, in 1824. He 

joined the Millerite movement in 1843, at the age of 19. He “lost 

his religion” completely after the “Great Disappointment” in 1844 

and went to Australia where he became a miner during the gold 

rush there. 38 Then, in 1859 he returned to America by way of 

London, England. In a retrospect Barbour tells how his interest in 

the prophetic time periods was again aroused during this voyage: 

The vessel left Australia with an advent brother [Barbour 

himself] on board, who had lost his religion, and been for many 

years in total darkness. To wile away the monotony of a long sea 

voyage, [an] English chaplain proposed a systematic reading of the 

prophecies; to which the brother readily assented; for having been 

a Millerite in former years, he knew right well there were 

arguments it would puzzle the chaplain to answer, even though the 

time had passed. 39 

During this reading Barbour thought he discovered the crucial 

error in Miller’s reckoning. Why did Miller begin the 1,260 “yeardays” 

of Revelation 11 in 538 C.E. and start the 1,290 and 1,335 

year-days of Daniel 12 thirty years earlier in 508 C.E.? Should not all 

three periods start at the same date? Then the 1,290 years would 

end in 1828 and the 1,335 years in—not 1843 but―1873. “On 

arriving in London [in 1860], he went to the library of the British 

Museum, and among many other extensive works on the 

prophecies found Elliott’s Horae Apocalypticae” in which Elliott 

reproduced a table, “The Scripture Chronology of the World,” 

prepared by his friend, Reverend Christopher Bowen. The table 

showed that 5,979 years since man’s creation ended in 1851. 40 

Adding 21 years to the 5,979 years, Barbour discovered that 6,000 

years would end in 1873. This he saw as a remarkable and stirring 

confirmation of his own calculation of the 1,335-year period. 

On returning to the United States, Barbour tried to interest 

other Second Adventists in his new date for the coming of the 

Lord. From 1868 onward he began to preach and publish his 

findings. A number of his articles on chronology were published in 

the World’s Crisis and the Advent Christian Times, the two leading 

papers of the Advent Christian Association. In 1870 he also 

38 Nelson H. Barbour, Evidences for the Coming of the Lord in 1873; or the Midnight 

Cry, 2nd ed. (Rochester., 1871), p. 32. 

39 Ibid., p. 32. 

40 Ibid., p.33; E. B. Elliott, Horae Apocalypticae, 4th ed. (London: Seeleys,1851), Vol. 

IV; fly-leaf appended at p. 236. Elliott’s work at that time, 1860, was a standard 

work advocating 1866 as the time of the coming of the Lord. 

44


published the 100-page pamphlet Evidences for the Coming of the Lord 

in 1873; or the Midnight Cry, the second edition of which has been 

quoted above. 41 In 1873 he started a monthly of his own called The 

Midnight Cry, and Herald of the Morning, the circulation of which 

within three months ran up to 15,000 copies. 42 When the target 

year of 1873 had nearly passed, Barbour advanced the time of the 

second advent to the autumn of 1874. 43 But when that year, too, 

came and went, Barbour and his followers experienced great 

concern: 

When 1874 came and there was no outward sign of Jesus 

in the literal clouds and in a fleshly form, there was a general 

reexamination of all the arguments upon which the ‘Midnight Cry’ 

was made. And when no fault or flaw could be found, it led to the 

critical examination of the Scriptures which seem to bear on the 

manner of Christ’s coming, and it was soon discovered that the 

expectation of Jesus in the flesh at the second coming was the 

mistake . . . . 44 

An “invisible presence” 

One of the readers of the Midnight Cry, B. W. Keith (later one of 

the contributors to Zion’s Watch Tower), 

. . . had been reading carefully Matt. xxiv chapter, using the 

‘Emphatic Diaglott’ , a new and very exact word for word 

41 Nelson H. Barbour (ed.), Herald of the Morning (Rochester, N.Y.), September 1879, 

p.36. Actually, Barbour’s new date for the second advent was adopted by an 

increasing number of Second Adventists, especially within the Advent Christian 

Church, with which Barbour evidently associated for a number of years. One 

reason for this readiness to accept the 1873 date was that it was not new to them. 

As Barbour points out in his Evidences . . . (pp. 33, 34), Miller himself had 

mentioned 1873 after the 1843 failure. Prior to 1843, several expositors in England 

had ended the 1,335 years in 1873, for instance John Fry in 1835 and George 

Duffield in 1842. (Froom, Vol. III, pp. 496, 497; Vol. IV, p. 337) As early as 1853 

the “age to come” Adventist Joseph Marsh in Rochester, N.Y., concluded, 1ike 

other expositors before him, that the “time of the end” was a period of 75 years 

that began in 1798 and would expire in 1873. (D. T. Arthur, op. cit., p. 360) In 

1870 the well-known Advent Christian preacher Jonas Wendell included Barbour’s 

chronology in his pamphlet The Present Truth; or, Meat in Due Season (Edenboro, 

PA, 1870). The increasing interest in the date caused the Advent Christian Church 

to arrange a special conference, February 6 to 11, 1872, in Worcester, Mass., for 

the examination of the time of the Lord’s return and especially the 1873 date. 

Many preachers, including Barbour, participated in the discussions. As reported in 

the Advent Christian Times of March 12, 1872, ‘The point on which there seemed 

to be any general unanimity was the ending of the thirteen hundred and thirty-five 

years in 1873.” (p. 263) 

42 Nelson H. Barbour (ed.), The Midnight Cry, and Herald of the Morning (Boston, 

Mass.) Vol. I:4, March, 1874,p. 50. 

43 N. H. Barbour, “The 1873 Time,” The Advent Christian Times, Nov. 11, 1873, p. 

106. 

44 Zion’s Watch Tower, October and November 1881, p. 3 (= Reprints, p. 289). 

45


translation of the New Testament [translated and published by 

Benjamin Wilson in 1864]; when he came to the 37th and 39th 

verses he was much surprised to find that it read as follows, viz.: 

‘For as the days of Noah thus will be the presence of the son of 

man’. 45 

Keith thus found the Greek word parousia, usually translated 

“coming,” here translated as “presence.” A widely held idea among 

expositors at this time was that Christ’s second coming would take 

place in two stages, the first of which would be invisible! 46 Could it 

be that Jesus had come in the fall of 1874, though invisible, and been 

invisibly present since then? 

To Barbour this explanation not only seemed attractive, but as 

he and his associates could find no faults with their calculations, 

they saw in it the solution to their problem. The date was right, 

although their expectations had been wrong. 

Once again, it was seen as a case of having expected “the wrong 

thing at the right time”: 

It was evident, then, that though the manner in which they had 

expected Jesus was in error, yet the time, as indicated by the 

‘Midnight Cry,’ was correct, and that the Bridegroom came in the 

Autumn of 1874 . . . . 45 

Most readers of the Midnight Cry, and Herald of the Morning 

magazine, however, could not accept this explanation, and the 

15,000 readers rapidly “dwindled to about 200.” Barbour himself 

was convinced that the Millennial morning had already begun to 

dawn, and therefore he thought that the Midnight Cry no longer was 

a suitable name for his paper. He remarked: “Will some one inform 

me how a ‘Midnight Cry’ can be made in the morning?” 47 The paper, 

which had ceased publication in October 1874, was therefore 

45 Zion’s Watch Tower ,February 1881,p. 3, and October–November 1881, p. 3 

(=Reprints, pp. 188 and 289). 

46 This idea of Christ’s return was originally presented in about 1828 by a banker 

and expositor of the prophecies in London, Henry Drummond. It soon became very 

popular among the expositors of the prophecies during the rest of the century, 

especially among the Darbyists, who did much to popularize the idea. It was much 

discussed in the leading millenarian periodicals, in England in the Quarterly 

Journal of Prophecy (1849–1873) and The Rainbow (1864–1887), and in the United 

States in the Prophetic Times (1863–1881). The chief editor of the last mentioned 

paper (which was widely read also in Adventist circles, including that of C. T. 

Russell and his associates) was the well-known Lutheran minister Joseph A. 

Seiss.—An examination of the origin and dispersion of the “invisible presence” idea 

is found in The Christian Quest magazine (Christian Renewal Ministries, San Jose, 

CA), Vol. 1:2, 1988, pp. 37–59, and Vol. 2:1, 1989, pp. 47–58. 

47 Ibid., April 1880, p. 7 (= Reprints, p. 88). 

46


restarted in June 1875 as the Herald of the Morning, thereby 

dispensing with the first part of the earlier title. 

In one of the very first issues (September, 1875), Barbour 

published his calculation of the Gentile times, making them 

terminate in 1914 C.E. 48 (See following page.) 

Charles Taze Russell 

In 1870, as an 18-year-old businessman in Allegheny, Pennsylvania, 

Charles Taze Russell, together with his father Joseph and some 

friends formed a class for Bible study. 49 The group was formed as 

an outgrowth of Russell’s contacts with some of the former 

Millerites mentioned above, especially Jonas Wendell, George 

Storrs, and George Stetson. 

Wendell, a preacher from the Advent Christian Church in 

Edenboro, Pennsylvania, had visited Allegheny in 1869, and by 

chance Russell went to one of his meetings and was strongly 

impressed by Wendell’s criticism of the hellfire doctrine. Russell 

had been brought up a Calvinist, but had recently broken with this 

religious background because of his doubts in the predestination 

48 Actually, Barbour hinted at the calculation already in the June, 1875 issue of 

Herald of the Morning, by stating that the Gentile times began with the end of reign 

of Zedekiah in 606 B.C., although he did not directly mention the terminal date (p. 

15). In the July issue, he stated that the Gentile times would “continue yet forty 

years.” Although this seems to point to 1915, it is clear from the subsequent 

issues that Barbour had the year 1914 in mind. The August issue contains an 

article on “Chronology” (pp. 38–42), but the Gentile times are not discussed. The 

1914 date is directly mentioned for the first time in the September, 1875 issue, 

where the following statement is found on page 52: “I believe that though the 

gospel dispensation will end in 1878, the Jews will not be restored to Palestine, 

until 1881; and that the ‘times of the Gentiles,’ viz. their seven prophetic times, of 

2520, or twice 1260 years, which began where God gave all, into the hands of 

Nebuchadnezzar, 606 B.C.; do not end until A.D. 1914; or 40 years from this.” A 

lengthy discussion of the calculation was then published in the issue of October 

1875, pp. 74–76. 

49 Charles’ parents, Joseph L. and Ann Eliza (Birney) Russell, were both of Scottish- 

Irish descent. They had left Ireland during the great Irish famine of 1845–1849, 

when one and a half million people starved to death and another million emigrated 

abroad. Joseph and Eliza settled in Allegheny in 1846, where Charles was born in 

1852 as number two of three children. As Eliza died in about 1860, Joseph had to 

take care of the upbringing of the children. As a youngster, Charles spent most of 

his leisure time in his father’s clothing store, and at an early age he became 

Joseph’s business partner. Their successful company, “J. L. Russell & Son, Gents’ 

Furnishing Goods,” finally developed into a chain of five stores in Allegheny and 

Pittsburgh.—For additional biographical notes on Russell, see M. James Penton, 

Apocalypse Delayed. The Story of Jehovah’s Witnesses (Toronto, Buffalo, London: 

University of Toronto Press, 1985, 1997), pp. 13–15. 

47


Herald of the Morning of September 1875 

in which N. H. Barbour first published the year 1914 as the end of the 

2,520 years. 

48


of the 2,520 years and hellfire doctrines. He was in a serious 

religious crisis at this time and even questioned if the Bible really 

was the word of God. His meeting with Wendell and his 

subsequent reading of Storrs’ magazine, the Bible Examiner, restored 

his faith in the Bible. Articles published in this magazine seem to 

have been regularly discussed in Russell’s study group. 

Although Russell knew that some Adventists, including Jonas 

Wendell, expected Christ in 1873, he himself rejected the whole 

concept of time settings and fixing of dates. Then, in 1876, he 

began to alter his position: 

It was about January, 1876, that my attention was specially 

drawn to the subject of prophetic time, as it relates to these 

doctrines and hopes. It came about in this way: I received a paper 

called The Herald of the Morning, sent by its editor, Mr. N. H. 

Barbour? 50 

Russell states he was surprised to find that Barbour’s group had 

come to the same conclusion as his own group about the manner of 

Christ’s return—that it would be “thieflike, and not in flesh, but as 

a spirit-being, invisible to men. 

Russell at once wrote to Barbour about the chronology, and 

later in 1876 he arranged to meet him in Philadelphia where Russell 

had business engagements that summer. Russell wanted Barbour to 

show him, “if he could, that the prophecies indicated 1874 as the 

date at which the Lord’s presence and ‘the harvest’ began.” “He 

came,” says Russell, “and the evidence satisfied me.” 51 

It is apparent that during these meetings Russell accepted not 

only the 1874 date but all of Barbour’s time calculations, including 

his calculation of the Gentile times. 52 While still in Philadelphia, 

Russell wrote an article entitled “Gentile Times: When do They 

End?” which was published in George Storrs’ periodical the Bible 

Examiner in the October 1876 issue. Referring to the “seven times” 

of Leviticus 26:28, 33 and Daniel 4 on page 27 of the Examiner, he 

determines the length of the Gentile times to be 2,520 years which 

50 Zion’s Watch Tower, July 15, 1906, pp. 230, 231 (= Reprints, p. 3822). 

51 Ibid. In a two-page “Supplement to Zion’s Watch Tower,” sent out “To the readers of 

‘Herald of the Morning” with the first issue of Zion’s Watch Tower and Herald of 

Christ’s Presence of July 1,1879, Russell gives an account of his meeting with 

Barbour and his associate John Paton in 1876 and their subsequent collaboration 

for the following three years in spreading the “Harvest message,” and explains why 

he had to break with Barbour in 1879 and start his own paper. 

52 This is also indicated by Russell himself who states: “ . . . when we first met, he 

had much to learn from me on the fulness of restitution based upon the sufficiency 

of the ransom given for all, as I had much to learn from him concerning time.” — 

Zion’s Watch Tower, July 15, 1906, p. 231 (= Reprints, p. 3822). 

49


began in 606 B .C.E. and would end in 1914 C.E.—precisely the 

same dates Barbour had arrived at and had begun publishing a year 

earlier, in 1875. 

Looking forward to 1914 

What, exactly, would the end of the “Gentile times” mean for 

mankind? Although monumental events relating to Christ’s return 

were proclaimed to have taken place in 1874, these were all said to 

be invisible, occurring in the spirit realm unseen by human eyes. 

Would 1914 and the termination of the Gentile times be the same, 

or would it bring visible, tangible change for the earth and for 

human society on it? 

In the book The Time is at Hand, published in 1889 (later referred 

to as Volume II of Studies in the Scriptures), Russell stated that there 

was “Bible evidence proving” that the 1914 date “will be the 

farthest limit of the rule of imperfect men.” What would be the 

consequences of this? Russell enumerated his expectations for 1914 

in seven points: 

Firstly, That at that date the Kingdom of God ... will have 

obtained full, universal control, and that it will then be ‘set up,’ or 

firmly established, in the earth. 

Secondly, It will prove that he whose right it is thus to take 

dominion will then be present as earth’s new ruler ... 

Thirdly, It will prove that some time before the end of A. D. 

1914 the last member of the divinely recognized Church of Christ, 

the ‘royal priesthood,’ ‘the body of Christ,’ will be glorified with 

the Head ... 

Fourthly, It will prove that from that time forward Jerusalem 

shall no longer be trodden down of the Gentiles, but shall arise 

from the dust of divine disfavor, to honor; because the ‘Times of 

the Gentiles’ will be fulfilled or completed. 

Fifthly, It will prove that by that date, or sooner, Israel’s 

blindness will begin to be turned away; because their ‘blindness in 

part’ was to continue only ‘until the fulness of the Gentiles be 

come in’ (Rom. 11:25) ... 

Sixthly, It will prove that the great ‘time of trouble such as 

never was since there was a nation,’ will reach its culmination in a 

worldwide reign of anarchy . . . and the ‘new heavens and new 

earth’ with their peaceful blessings will begin to be recognized by 

trouble-tossed humanity. 

Seventhly, It will prove that before that date God’s Kingdom, 

organized in power, will be in the earth and then smite and crush 

the Gentile image (Dan. 2:34)—and fully consume the power of 

50

these kings. 53 


These were indeed very daring predictions. Did Russell really 

believe that all these remarkable things would come true within the 

next twenty five years? Yes, he did; in fact, he believed his 

chronology to be God’s chronology, not just his own. In 1894 he 

wrote of the 1914 date: 

We see no reason for changing the figures—nor could we 

change them if we would. They are, we believe, God’s dates, not ours. 

But bear in mind that the end of 1914 is not the date for the 

beginning, but for the end of the time of trouble. 54 

Thus it was thought that the “time of trouble” was to 

commence some years before 1914, “not later than 1910,” reaching 

its climax in 1914. 55 

In 1904, however, just ten years before 1914, Russell altered his 

view on this matter. In an article in the July 1, 1904 issue of Zion’s 

Watch Tower, entitled “Universal anarchy—just before or after 

October, 1914 A.D.,” he argued that the time of trouble, with its 

worldwide anarchy, would begin after October, 1914: 

We now expect that the anarchistic culmination of the great 

time of trouble which will precede the Millennial blessings will be 

after October, 1914 A.D.—very speedily thereafter, in our 

opinion— ‘in an hour,’ ‘suddenly,’ because ‘our forty years’ 

harvest, ending October, 1914 A.D., should not be expected to 

include the awful period of anarchy which the Scriptures point out 

to be the fate of Christendom. 56 

This change caused some readers to think that there might be 

other errors in the chronological system, too—one reader even 

suggesting that Bishop Ussher’s chronology might be more correct 

when it dated the destruction of Jerusalem as having happened in 

587 B.C.E. rather than in 606 B.C.E. This would end the 2,520 

years in about 1934 instead of 1914. But Russell strongly 

reaffirmed his belief in the 1914 date, referring to other claimed 

“time parallels” pointing to it: 

53 C. T. Russell, The Time is at Hand (= Vol. II of the Millennial Dawn series; later 

called Studies in the Scriptures), Pittsburgh: Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society, 

1889, pp. 77, 78. Some of the predictions were slightly changed in later editions. 

54 Zion’s Watch Tower, July 15, 1894 (= Reprints, p. 1677). 

55 Ibid., September 15, 1901 (= Reprints, p. 2876). 

56 Ibid., July 1, 1904, pp. 197,198 (= Reprints, p. 3389). 

51


We know of no reason for changing a figure: to do so would 

spoil the harmonies and parallels so conspicuous between the 

Jewish and Gospel ages. 57 

Answering another reader, he said: 

The harmony of the prophetic periods is one of the strongest 

proofs of the correctness of our Bible chronology. They fit 

together like the cogwheels of a perfect machine. To change the 

chronology even one year would destroy all this harmony,—so accurately are 

the various proofs drawn together in the parallels between the 

Jewish and Gospel ages. 58 

These arguments were further backed up by articles written by 

the Edgar brothers of Scotland. 59 

Growing doubts 

So in 1904 Russell was still as convinced of his dates as he was in 

1889, when he wrote that the understanding of these time features 

was the “sealing of the foreheads” mentioned at Revelation 7:3. 60 

As the 1914 date drew nearer, however, Russell became more 

and more cautious in his statements. Answering an inquiring Bible 

student in 1907, he said that “we have never claimed our 

calculations to be infallibly correct; we have never claimed that they 

were knowledge, nor based upon indisputable evidence, facts, 

knowledge; our claim has always been that they are based on 

faith.” 61 

The dates no longer seemed to qualify as “God’s dates,” as he 

had stated thirteen years earlier; now they might be fallible. Russell 

even considered the possibility that 1914 (and 1915) could pass by 

with none of the expected events having occurred: 

But let us suppose a case far from our expectations: suppose 

that A.D. 1915 should pass with the world’s affairs all serene and 

with evidence that the ‘very elect’ had not all been ‘changed’ and 

without the restoration of natural Israel to favor under the New 

Covenant. (Rom. 11:12, 15) What then? Would not that prove our 

chronology wrong? Yes, surely! And would not that prove a keen 

disappointment? Indeed it would! . . . What a blow that would be! 

One of the strings of our ‘harp’ would be quite broken! However, 

57 Ibid., October 1, 1904, pp. 296, 297 (= Reprints, pp. 3436, 3437). 

58 Ibid., August 15, 1904, pp. 250, 251 (= Reprints, p. 3415). Emphasis added. 

59 Ibid., November 15, 1904, pp. 342–344; June 15, 1905, pp. 179–186 (= Reprints, 

pp. 3459, 3460, 3574–3579). 

60 C. T. Russell, The Time is at Hand, p. 169. 

61 Zion’s Watch Tower, October 1, 1907, pp. 294, 295 (= Reprints, p. 4067). 

52


dear friends, our harp would still have all the other strings in tune 

and that is what no other aggregation of God’s people on earth 

could boast. 62 

Another point of uncertainty was whether a year 0 (between 1 

B.C.E. and 1 C.E.) was to be included in the calculation or not. 

This matter had been brought up by Russell as early as 1904, but 

gained in importance as the year 1914 approached. 

The 1914 date had been arrived at simply by subtracting 606 

from 2,520, but gradually it was realized that no year 0 is allowed 

for in our present calendar of era reckoning. Consequently, from 

October 1, 606 B.C.E. to the beginning of January, 1 C.E. was only 

605 years and 3 months, and from the beginning of January, 1 C.E. 

to October 1914 was only 1913 years and 9 months, making a total 

of 2,519 years, not 2,520. This would mean that the 2,520 years 

would end in October 1915, rather than October 1914. 63 But when 

the war broke out in Europe in August 1914, it apparently seemed 

ill-timed to correct this error. It was allowed to stand. 

By 1913, with 1914 on the doorstep, the cautiousness regarding 

that year had increased. In the article “Let Your Moderation Be 

Known,” which appeared in the June 1, 1913 issue of The Watch 

Tower, Russell warned his readers against spending “valuable time 

and energy in guessing what will take place this year, next year, 

etc.” His confidence in his earlier published scheme of events was 

no longer evident: “This is the good tidings of God’s grace in 

Christ—whether the completion of the church shall be 

accomplished before 1914 or not.” 64 He expressed himself still 

more vaguely in the October 15 issue of the same year: 

We are waiting for the time to come when the government of 

the world will be turned over to Messiah. We cannot say that it may 

not be either October 1914, or October 1915. It is possible that we 

62 Ibid. 

63 The Watch Tower, December 1, 1912 (= Reprints, pp. 5141, 5142). As the First 

World War broke out in 1914 and that year was retained as the end of the Gentile 

times, the starting point of those times needed to be moved back one year from 

606 to 607 B.C.E. in order to preserve a total of 2,520 years. Although some of the 

Society’s adherents had pointed this fact out very early (see, for example, the 

footnote on page 32 of John and Morton Edgar’s Great Pyramid Passages, 2nd ed., 

1924) this necessary adjustment was not made by the Watch Tower Society until 

1943, when it was presented in the book, The Truth Shall Make You Free, on page 

239. See also the book, The Kingdom is at Hand, 1944, p. 184. For additional 

details, see next chapter, page 79. 

64 The Watch Tower, June 1, 1913, pp. 166, 16 (= Reprints, p. 5249). 

53


might be out of the correct reckoning on the subject a number of years. We 

cannot say with certainty. We do not know. It is a matter of faith, 

and not of knowledge. 65 

Earlier, 1914 had been one of “God’s dates,” and “to change the 

chronology even one year would destroy all this harmony.” But 

now they “might be out of the correct reckoning on the subject a 

number of years,” and nothing on the matter could be said “with 

certainty” This was truly a volte-face! If it was indeed “a matter of 

faith,” one can only wonder in what or in whom that faith was to be 

based. 

Russell’s own tottering faith in his chronology was further 

brought to light in The Watch Tower of January 1, 1914, in which he 

stated: “As already pointed out, we are by no means confident that 

this year, 1914, will witness as radical and swift changes of 

dispensation as we have expected, “ 66 The article “The Days Are At 

Hand” in the same issue is especially revealing: 

If later it should be demonstrated that the church is not 

glorified by October, 1914, we shall try to feel content with 

whatever the Lord’s will may be. . . . If 1915 should go by without 

the passage of the church, without the time of trouble, etc., it 

would seem to some to be a great calamity. It would not be so 

with ourselves. . . . If in the Lord’s providence the time should come 

twenty-five years later, then that would be our will. . . . If October, 

1915, should pass, and we should find ourselves still here and 

matters going on very much as they are at present, and the world 

apparently making progress in the way of settling disputes, and 

there were no time of trouble in sight, and the nominal church 

were not yet federated, etc., we would say that evidently we have 

been out somewhere in our reckoning. In that event we would 

look over the prophecies further, to see if we could find an error. 

And then we would think, Have we been expecting the wrong thing in the 

right time? The Lord’s will might permit this. 67 

Again, in the May 1, 1914 issue—forgetting his earlier 

statements about “God’s dates” and of “Bible evidence proving” that 

the predicted developments would occur in 1914—Russell told his 

readers that “in these columns and in the six volumes of STUDIES 

IN THE SCRIPTURES we have set forth everything appertaining 

to the times and seasons in a tentative form; that is to say, not with 

positiveness, not with the claim that we knew, but merely with the 

suggestion that ‘thus and so’ seems to be the teaching of the 

Bible.” 68 

65 Ibid., October 15, 1913, p. 307 (= Reprints, p. 5328). Emphasis added. 

66 Ibid., January 1, 1914, pp. 3,4 (= Reprints, p. 5373). 

67 Ibid., pp. 4,5 (= Reprints, p. 5374). Emphasis added. 

68 Ibid., May 1, 1914, pp. 134, 135 (= Reprints, p. 5450). Emphasis added. 

54


Two months later Russell seemed to be on the point of rejecting 

his chronology altogether. Answering a colporteur, who wanted to 

know if the Studies in the Scriptures were to be circulated after 

October, 1914, “since you [Russell] have some doubts respecting 

the full accomplishment of all expected by or before October, 

1914,” Russell replied: 

It is our thought that these books will be on sale and read for 

years in the future, provided the Gospel age and its work 

continue. . . . We have not attempted to say that these views are 

infallible, but have stated the processes of reasoning and figuring, 

leaving to each reader the duty and privilege of reading, thinking 

and figuring for himself. 

That will be an interesting matter a hundred years from now; and if he can 

figure and reason better, he will still be interested in what we have 

presented. 69 

Thus, by July 1914, Russell now seemed ready to accept the 

thought that the 1914 date probably was a failure, and that his 

writings on the matter were going to be merely of historical interest 

to Bible students a hundred years later! 

Reactions to the outbreak of the war 

With the outbreak of the war in Europe in August 1914, Russell’s 

wavering confidence in the chronology began to recover. Although 

the war itself did not exactly fit into the predicted pattern of 

events—that the “time of trouble” would be a class struggle 

between capital and labor, leading up to a period of worldwide 

anarchy —he saw in the war the prelude to that situation: 

Socialism is, we believe, the main factor in the war now raging 

and which will be earth’s greatest and most terrible war—and 

probably the last. 70 

Later in 1914, he wrote: 

We think that the present distress amongst the nations is merely 

the beginning of this time of trouble. . . . The anarchy that will 

follow this war will be the real time of trouble. Our thought is that 

the war will so weaken the nations that following it there will be an 

attempt to bring in Socialistic ideas, and that this will be met by the 

governments — [etc., leading up to worldwide class struggle and 

anarchy]. 71 

69 Ibid., July 1, 1914, pp. 206, 207 (= Reprints, p. 5496). Emphasis added. 

70 Ibid., August 15, 1914, pp. 243,244 (= Reprints, p. 5516). 

71 Ibid., November 1, 1914, pp. 327, 328 (= Reprints, p. 5567). 

55


Like other millenarian authors, Russell believed that the 

expiration of the Gentile times would mean a restoration of the 

Jewish nation in Palestine. Toward the end of 1914, however, 

Palestine and Jerusalem were still occupied by Gentiles. It seemed 

obvious that the restoration would not begin to occur in 1914 as 

had been predicted. In the November 1 issue of The Watch Tower, 

therefore, Russell tried to reinterpret the end of the Gentile times 

to mean the end of the persecution of the Jews: 

The treading down of the Jews has stopped. All over the world 

the Jews are now free—even in Russia. On September 5, the Czar 

of Russia issued a proclamation to all the Jews of the Russian 

Empire; and this was before the times of the Gentiles had expired. 

It stated that the Jews might have access to the highest rank in the 

Russian army, and that the Jewish religion was to have the same 

freedom as any other religion in Russia. Where are the Jews being 

trodden down now? Where are they being subjected to scorn? At 

present they are receiving no persecution whatever. We believe 

that the treading down of Jerusalem has ceased, because the time 

for the Gentiles to tread down Israel has ended. 72 

However, the relief for the Jews in Russia and elsewhere 

referred to by Russell turned out to be only temporary. He could 

not, of course, foresee the coming fierce persecutions of the Jews 

in Germany, Poland, and other countries during the Second World 

War. 

From the outbreak of the First World War and up to his death 

on October, 1916, Russell’s restored confidence in his chronology 

remained unshaken, as demonstrated by the following extracts 

from various issues of The Watch Tower during the period: 

January 1, 1915: “ . . . the war is the one predicted in the 

Scriptures as associated with the great day of Almighty God—‘the 

day of vengeance of our God.’” 73 

September 15, 1915: “Tracing the Scriptural chronology down to 

our day, we find that we are now living in the very dawn of the 

great seventh day of man’s great week. This is abundantly 

corroborated by the events now taking place about us on every 

hand” 74 

72 Ibid., pp. 329, 330 (= Reprints, p. 5568). 

73 Ibid., January 1, 1915, pp. 3, 4 (= Reprints, p. 5601). 

74 Ibid., September 15, 1915, pp. 281, 282 (= Reprints, p. 5769). 

56


February 15, 1916: “In STUDIES IN THE SCRIPTURES, Vol. 

IV, we have clearly pointed out the things now transpiring, and the 

worse conditions yet to come.” 75 

April 15, 1916: “We believe that the dates have proven to be 

quite right. We believe that Gentile Times have ended, and that 

God is now allowing the Gentile Governments to destroy 

themselves, in order to prepare the way for Messiah’s kingdom.” 76 

September 1, 1916: “It still seems clear to us that the prophetic 

period known to us as the Times of the Gentiles ended 

chronologically in October, 1914. The fact that the great day of 

wrath upon the nation began there marks a good fulfilment of our 

expectations.” 77 

In November 1918, however, the First World War suddenly 

ended—without being followed by a worldwide Socialist 

revolution and anarchy, as had been predicted. The last member of 

the “divinely recognized Church of Christ” had not been glorified, 

the city of Jerusalem was still being controlled by the Gentiles, the 

kingdom of God had not crushed “the Gentile image,” and the 

“new heavens and the new earth” could not be seen anywhere by 

trouble-tossed humanity. Not a single one of the seven predictions 

enumerated in the book The Time is at Hand had come true. 78 

Pastor Russell’s “Bible Students” were confused, to say the least. 

Yet—though not among the predictions— something had 

happened: The World War. Could it be that the time was right, 

after all, even though the predictions had failed? The explanation 

resorted to by the Adventists after 1844 and by Barbour and his 

associates after 1874—that they had expected “the wrong thing at 

the right time”—now seemed even more appropriate. 79 But how 

could the time be right, when all predictions based on it had failed? 

For years many of Russell’s followers experienced deep perplexity 

because of the non-arrival of the predicted events. After the lapse 

of some years, J. F. Rutherford, Russell’s successor as president of 

75 Ibid., February 15, 1916, pp. 51, 52 (= Reprints, p. 5852). 

76 Ibid., April 15, 1916 (= Reprints, p. 5888). 

77 Ibid., September 1, 1916, pp. 263, 264 (= Reprints, p. 5950). 

78 See above, pages 50, 51. For a long time after 1914 it was held that the “time of 

trouble” (Matt. 24:21, 22) really began in that year, but this view was finally 

abandoned by the Watch Tower Society in 1969. (See The Watchtower, January 15, 

1970, pp. 49–56.) 

79 A. H. Macmillan, Faith on the March (New York: Prentice Hall, Inc., 1957), p.48. 

57


the Watch Tower Society, began to explain, step by step, what 

“really” had been fulfilled from 1914 onward. 

In the address “The Kingdom of Heaven is at Hand” at the 

September 5–13, 1922, Cedar Point Convention, Rutherford told 

his audience that the Kingdom of God really had been established in 

1914, not on earth but in the invisible heavens! 80 And three years later, 

in 1925, he applied Revelation 12 to this event, stating that God’s 

Kingdom was born in heaven in 1914 according to this prophecy. 81 

Previously the Watch Tower’s predictions had all been of an 

obvious, clearly visible, takeover of earth’s rulership by Christ. 

Now this was presented as something invisible, evident only to a 

select group. 

Also at the Cedar Point Convention in 1922, Rutherford for the 

first time presented the view that “in 1918, or thereabouts, the 

Lord came to his (spiritual) temple.” 82 Earlier, Russell and his 

associates had held the view that the heavenly resurrection took 

place in 1878. But in 1927 Rutherford transferred that event to 

1918. 83 Likewise in the early 1930’s, Rutherford changed the date 

for the beginning of Christ’s invisible presence from 1874 to 1914. 84 

Thus Rutherford gradually replaced the unfulfilled predictions 

with a series of invisible and spiritual events associated with the years 

1914 and 1918. Ninety years after 1914 Rutherford’s 

“explanations” are still held by Jehovah’s Witnesses. 

80 New Heavens and a New Earth (Brooklyn, N.Y.: Watchtower Bible and Tract 

Society, 1953), p. 225. Until 1922, that is, for over forty years, the Bible Students 

had believed and taught that the kingdom of God had begun to be established in 

heaven in 1878. This event was now transferred to 1914. ― See The Time is at 

Hand (= Vol. II of Millennial Dawn), 1889, p. 101. 

81 See the article ‘Birth of a Nation” in The Watch Tower of March 1, 1925. 

82 The Watch Tower, October 1, 1922, p. 298; November 1, 1922, p. 334. 

83 From Paradise Lost to Paradise Regained (Brooklyn, N.Y.: Watchtower Bible and 

Tract Society, 1958), p. 192. 

84 As of 1929 the Watch Tower Society still taught that “the second presence of the 

Lord Jesus Christ began in 1874 AD.” (Prophecy, Brooklyn, N.Y.: International 

Bible Students Association, 1929, p.65.) The exact date for the transference of the 

second coming from 1874 to 1914 is difficult to pinpoint. For some time confusing 

statements may be found in the publications. Perhaps the first indication of a 

change is the statement in The Golden Age of April 30, 1930, page 503, that 

“Jesus has been present since the year 1914.” However, The Watch Tower of 

October 15, 1930, somewhat vaguely states on page 308 that “the second advent 

of the Lord Jesus Christ dates from about 1875.” Then, in 1931, the booklet, The 

Kingdom, the Hope of the World, again indicates that the second coming occurred 

in 1914. And in 1932 the booklet What is Truth clearly states on page 48: “The 

prophecy of the Bible, fully supported by the physical facts in fulfilment thereof, 

shows that the second coming of Christ dates from the fall of the year 1914.” 

58

Summary 


The interpretation of the “Gentile times” as having been of 2,520 

years, beginning in 607 B.C.E. (earlier, 606 B.C.E.) and ending in 

1914 C.E., was not some divine revelation made to Pastor Charles 

Taze Russell in the autumn of 1876. On the contrary, this idea has 

a long history of development, with its roots far back in the past. 

It had its origin in the “year-day principle,” first posited by 

Rabbi Akibah ben Joseph in the first century C.E. From the ninth 

century onward this principle was applied to the time periods of 

Daniel by several Jewish rabbis. 

Among Christians, Joachim of Floris in the twelfth century 

probably was the first to pick up the idea, applying it to the 1,260 

days of Revelation and the three and one-half times of Daniel. 

After Joachim’s death, his followers soon identified the 1,260 year 

period with the Gentile times of Luke 21:24, and this interpretation 

was then common among groups, including the Reformers, 

branded as heretics by the church of Rome during the following 

centuries. 

As time passed, and expectations failed when earlier 

explanations proved to be wrong, the starting-point of the 1,260 

(or, 1290) years was progressively moved forward, in order to make 

them end in a then near future. 

The first to arrive at a period of 2,520 years was apparently John 

Aquila Brown in 1823. Although his calculation was founded upon 

the “seven times” of Daniel 4, he did not equate those periods with 

the “Gentile times” of Luke 21:24. But this was very soon done by 

other expositors. Fixing the starting-point at 604 B.C.E., Brown 

reached the year 1917 as the seven times’ termination date. By 

using different starting-points, other biblical commentators in the 

following decades arrived at a number of different terminal dates. 

Some writers, who experimented with biblical “Jubilee cycles,” 

arrived at a period of 2,450 (or, 2,452) years (49x49+49), which 

they held to be the period of the Gentile times. 

The accompanying table presents a selection of applications of the 

2,520 (and 2,450) years made by different authors during the last 

century. The calculations were in fact so numerous, that it would 

probably be difficult to find a single year between the 1830’s and 

1930’s that does not figure in some calculation as the terminal date 

of the Gentile times! That a number of expositors pointed to 1914 

or other years near to that date, such as 1915, 1916, 1917, 1918, 

1919, 1922 and 1923, is, therefore, not a cause for astonishment. 

59


TABLE 2: APPLICATIONS OF THE 2,520 (OR 2,450) YEAR 

Expositor Date Publication 

Application 

BCE–CE 

Comments 

John Aquila Brown 

William Cuninghame 

1823 

1827 

The Even-Tide . . . 

Dialogues on Prophecy, Vol.1 

604–1917 

728–1792 

= “Seven times” of Daniel 4 

Report of the prophetic conferences 

Henry Drummond 1827 ” ” ” 722–1798 at Albury Park 

S. Faber 1828 The Sacred Calendar of Prophecy 657–1864 

Alfred Addis 1829 Heaven Opened 680–1840 

William Digby 1831 A Treatise on the 1260 Days 723–1793 

W. A, Holmes 

Matthew Habershon 

1833 

1834 

The Time of the End 

A Dissertation . . . 

685–1835 

677–1843 

John Fry 1835 Unfulfilled Prophecies . . . 677–1843 

William W. Pym 

William Miller 

1835 

1842 

A Word of Warning . . . 

The First Report . . . 

673–1847 

677–1843 

Th. R. Birks 1843 First Elements of Sacred Prophecy 606–1843 Gentile times = 2,450 years 

Edward B. Elliott 

” ” ” 

1844 

1844 

Horae Apocalypticae, Vol. 111 

” ” ” 

727–1793 

606–1914 A second alternative 

Matthew Habershon 1844 An Historical Exposition 676–1844 

” ” ” 1844 ” ” ” 601–1919 A second alternative 

William Cuninghame 1847 The Fulfilling . . . 606–1847 Gentile times = 2,452 years 

James Halley Frere 1848 The Great Continental Revolution 603–1847 Gentile times = 2,450 years 

Robert Seeley 1849 An Atlas of Prophecy 606–1914 Counted from “606 or 607” 

” ” ” 1849 ” ” ” 570–1950 A second alternative 

” ” ” 1849 ” ” ” 728–1792 A third alternative 

Edward Bickersteth 1850 A Scripture Help 727–1793 Another of his calculations 

” ” ” 1850 ” ” ” 602–1918 was 677-1843 

60


Anonymous 1856 The Watch Tower 727–1793 A pamphlet 

Richard C. Shimeall 1859 Our Bible Chronology 652–1868 

J. S. Phillips 1865 The Rainbow, March 1, 652–1867 A London periodical edited 

”J. M. N.” 1865 ” ” April 1, 658/47–1862/73 by William Leask 

Frederick W. Farrar 1865 ” ” November 1 654–1866 

Anonymous 1870 The Prophetic Times, December, 715–1805 A periodical edited by Joseph A. 

” 1870 ” ” ” ” 698–822 Seiss et al. These are some 

” 1870 ” ” ” ” 643–1877 examples; the writer gives twelve 

” 1870 ” ” ” ” 606–1914 different alternatives! 

” 1870 ” ” ” ” 598–1922 

Joseph Baylee 1871 The Times of the Gentiles 623–1896 

”P. H. G.” The Quarterley Journal of A London periodical edited by Horatius 

” ” ” 1871 Prophecy, April, 652/49–1868/71 Bonar 

Edward White 1874 Our Hope, June, 626–1894 A London periodical edited by Wm. Maude 

N. H. Barbour 

C. T. Russell 

1875 

1876 

Herald of the Morning, Sept & Oct., 

The Bible Examiner, October, 

606–1914 

606–1914 

Periodical published by Nelson H. Barbour 

Edited by George Storrs 

E. H. Tuckett 

M. P. Baxter 

1877 

1880 

The Rainbow, August, 

Forty Coming Wonders, 5th ed. 

651/50–1869/70 

695–1825 

” ” ” 

Grattan Guinness 

1880 

1886 

” ” ” 

Light for the Last Days 

” 620–1900 

606–1915 

A second alternative 

These are only some of his many, diverse 

” ” ” 1886 ” ” ” ” 604–1917 analyses 

” ” ” 1886 ” ” ” ” 598–1923 

” ” ” 1886 ” ” ” ” 587–1934 

W. E. Blackstone 1916 The Weekly Evangel, May 13 606–1915 This article sums up his viewpoints as 

” ” ” 1916 ” ” ” ” 595–1926 published many years earlier 

” ” ” 1916 ” ” ” ” 587–1934 

61


The 1914 date would most probably have drowned in the sea of 

other failed dates and been forgotten by now had it not happened 

to be the year of the outbreak of the First World War. 

When, back in 1844, E. B. Elliott suggested 1914 as a possible 

terminal date for the Gentile times, he reckoned the 2,520 years 

from Nebuchadnezzar’s accession-year, which he dated to 606 B.C.E. 

N. H. Barbour, however, reckoned the 2,520 years from the 

desolation of Jerusalem in Nebuchadnezzar’s 18th regnal year. But 

as he dated this event to 606 B.C.E., he, too, in 1875, arrived at 

1914 as the terminal date. Since their chronologies not only 

conflicted with each other, but also conflicted with the historically 

established chronology for Nebuchadnezzar’s reign, their arriving 

at the same terminal year was simply a coincidence, demonstrating 

how arbitrary and gratuitous their calculations really were. 

Barbour’s calculation was accepted by C. T. Russell at their 

meeting in 1876. Barbour was then fifty-two years old while Russell 

was twenty-four— still very young. Although their ways parted 

again in the spring of 1879, Russell stuck to Barbour’s time 

calculations, and since that time the 1914 date has been the pivotal 

point in prophetic explanations among Russell’s followers. 

Supplement to the third and later editions, chapter 1: 

The information presented in this chapter has been available to 

the Jehovah’s Witnesses since 1983, when the first edition of this 

book was published. In addition, the same information was 

summarized by Raymond Franz in chapter 7 of his widely known 

work, Crisis of Conscience, published in the same year. Thus—after 10 

years—in 1993 the Watch Tower Society finally felt compelled to 

admit that neither the 2,520-year calculation nor the 1914 date 

originated with Charles Taze Russell as it had held until then. 

Further, the Society now also admits that the predictions Russell 

and his associates attached to 1914 failed. 

These admissions are found on pages 134–137 of Jehovah’s 

Witnesses—Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom, a book on the history of the 

movement published by the Watch Tower Society in 1993. Prior to 

1993 the impression given had been that Russell was the first to 

publish the 2,520-year calculation pointing to 1914, doing this for 

the first time in the October, 1876 issue of George Storrs’ 

magazine the Bible Examiner. Also, that decades in advance Russell 

and his followers foretold the outbreak of World War I in 1914 and 

62


other events associated with the war. Thus the earlier organizational 

history book Jehovah’s Witnesses in the Divine Purpose quoted some 

very general statements made in the book The Plan of the Ages 

(published in 1886) about the “time of trouble” (originally believed 

to extend from 1874 to 1914) and claimed: 

Although this was still decades before the first world war, it is 

surprising how accurately the events that finally took place were actually 

foreseen. (Emphasis added.) 85 

Similarly, The Watchtower of August 1, 1971, made the following 

pretentious statements on page 468: 

From the Bible chronology, Jehovah’s witnesses as far back as 

1877 pointed to the year 1914 as one of great significance. . . . 

The momentous year of 1914 came, and with it World War I, 

the most widespread upheaval in history up to that time. It 

brought unprecedented slaughter, famine, pestilence and 

overthrow of governments. The world did not expect such horrible events 

as took place. But Jehovah’s witnesses did expect such things, and others 

acknowledged that they did... . 

How could Jehovah’s witnesses have known so far in advance what world 

leaders themselves did not know? Only by God’s holy spirit making such 

prophetic truths known to them. True, some today claim that those 

events were not hard to predict, since mankind has long known 

various troubles. But if those events were not hard to predict, then 

why were not all the politicians, religious leaders and economic experts doing 

so? Why were they telling the people the opposite? (Emphasis added.) 

Unfortunately for the Watch Tower Society, none of these 

claims are in accordance with the facts of history. Whether 

deliberate or the result of ignorance, each represents a serious 

distortion of reality. 

Firstly, although there were a number of predictions in the 

Watch Tower publications as to what would take place in 1914, 

none of them came close to a prediction of the outbreak of a world war in that 

year. 

Secondly, political and religious leaders, contrary to the 

statements in The Watchtower quoted above, long before 1914 expected 

that a great war sooner or later would break out in Europe. As early 

as 1871 Otto von Bismarck, the first Lord High Chancellor of the 

German Empire, declared that the “Great War” would come one 

day. For decades before 1914, the daily papers and weeklies were 

constantly occupied with the theme. To cite just one example 

among many, the January 1892 issue of the highly respected 

English weekly Black and White explained in an editorial 

introduction to a fictional serial on the coming war: 

85 Jehovah’s Witnesses in the Divine Purpose (Brooklyn, New York: Watchtower 

Bible & Tract Society, 1959), p. 31. 

63


The air is full of rumours of War. The European nations stand 

fully armed and prepared for instant mobilization. Authorities are 

agreed that a GREAT WAR must break out in the immediate future, and 

that this War will be fought under novel and surprising conditions. 

All facts seem to indicate that the coming conflict will be the 

bloodiest in history, and must involve the momentous 

consequences to the whole world. At any time the incident may 

occur which will precipitate the disaster. 86 

I. F. Clarke, in his book Voices Prophesying War 1763–1984, 

explains to what an extent the First World War “was being 

prepared in fact and in fiction”: 

From 1871 onwards the major European powers prepared for 

the great war that Bismarck had said would come one day. And for 

close on half a century, while the general staffs and the ministries 

argued about weapons, estimates, and tactics, the tale of the war-tocome 

was a dominant device in the field of purposive fiction.... The 

period from the eighteen-eighties to the long-expected outbreak of 

the next war in 1914 saw the emergence of the greatest number of 

these tales of coming conflicts ever to appear in European fiction. 87 

The people of that time, therefore, could not avoid being 

confronted with the constant predictions of a coming great war in 

Europe. The question was not if but when the Great War would 

break out. Here there was room for speculations, and many of the 

imaginative tales and novels suggested different dates. Specific 

dates were sometimes even pointed out in the very titles of the 

books, for example, Europa in Flammen. Der deutsche Zukunftskrieg 

1909 (”Europe in Flames. The Coming German War of 1909”), by 

Michael Wagebald, published in 1908, and The Invasion of 1910, by 

W. LeQueux, published in 1906. 

Politicians and statesmen, too, sometimes tried to pinpoint the 

specific year for the outbreak of the expected great war. One of the 

more lucky was M. Francis Delaisi, a member of the French 

Chamber of Deputies. In his article “La Guerre qui Vient” (”The 

Coming War”), published in the parish periodical La Guerre Sociale 

in 1911, he discusses at great length the diplomatic situation, 

concluding that “a terrible war between England and Germany is 

preparing.” As shown by the following extracts from his article, 

some of his political forecasts turned out to be remarkably 

accurate: 

A conflict is preparing itself compared with which the horrible 

slaughter of the Russo-Japanese war [in 1904–05] will be child’s 

play. In 1914 the [naval] forces of England and Germany will be 

almost equal. A Prussian army corps will advance with forced 

marches to occupy Antwerp. We, the French, will have to do the 

fighting on the Belgian plains. 

86 Quoted by I. F. Clarke in Voices Prophesying War 1763–1984 (London: Oxford 

University Press, 1966), pp. 66, 67. 

87 Ibid., p. 59. 

64

65 


All newspapers will print in headlines as large as your hand 

these prophetic words: THE BELGIUM NEUTRALITY HAS 

BEEN VIOLATED. THE PRUSSIAN ARMY IS MARCHING 

UPON LILLE. 88 

In the religious area, it was especially the “millennarians” that 

were then presenting predictions of the approaching end of the 

world. This movement included millions of Christians from 

different quarters, Baptists, Pentecostals, and so on. Pastor Russell 

and his followers, the “Bible Students,” were just a small branch of 

this broad movement. Common to them all was their pessimistic 

view of the future. In his book Armageddon Now! Dwight Wilson 

describes their reaction to the outbreak of the Great War in 1914: 

The war itself came as no shock to these opponents of 

postmillennial optimism; they had not only looked toward the 

culmination of the age in Armageddon, but anticipated ‘wars and 

rumors of wars’ as signs of the approaching end. 89 

Wilson then goes on to quote one of them, R. A. Torrey, dean 

of the Bible Institute of Los Angeles, who, in 1913, one year before 

the outbreak of the war, wrote in his book, The Return of the Lord 

Jesus: “We talk of disarmament, but we all know it is not coming. 

All our present peace plans will end in the most awful wars and 

conflicts this old world ever saw!” 90 

As Theodore Graebner tells in his book War in the Light of 

Prophecy, the war of 1914 had scarcely begun before a great host of 

writers from different religious quarters arose, claiming that the war 

had been foretold: 

Soon the announcement was made by several investigators: IT 

HAS BEEN FORETOLD. Immediately thousands of Bible 

Christians became interested. Immediately, too, others set to work 

on Gog and Magog, Armageddon, the Seventy Weeks, 666, 1,260, 

etc., and soon religious periodicals, in this country and abroad, 

contained the message, announced with greater or less assurance, 

IT HAS BEEN FORETOLD. Pamphlets and tracts appeared 

promulgating the same message, and soon a number of books 

were on the market, running to 350 pages each, which not only 

contained most circumstantial ‘proof’ for this assertion, but 

announced likewise the exact time when the war would come to a 

close, who would be the victor, and the significance of the war for 

the Christian Church, now (it was said) about to enter into her 

millennial period. 91 

88 Quoted by Theodore Graebner in his book, War in the Light of Prophecy. “Was it 

Foretold?” A Reply to Modern Chiliasm (St. Louis, Mo.: Concordia Publishing House, 

1941), pp. 14, 15. 

89 Dwight Wilson, Armageddon Now! (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1977), pp. 

36, 37. 

90 Ibid.. p. 37. 

91 Graebner, op. cit., p. 8, 9.


Graebner, who felt incited to examine a great number of these 

contentions, after a very thorough investigation concludes that: 

. . . the entire mass of millennial literature that flourished during 

the First World War—and a tremendous mass it was—was proved 

definitely, completely, absolutely, false by the events. In not a single 

point did the First World War develop as was to be expected after 

reading the chiliastic [millennialist] interpreters. Not a single [one] 

of them predicted the outcome of the war. Not a single [one] of 

them foretold the entrance of the United States. Not a single [one] 

of them foretold World War II. 92 

Pastor Russell’s speculations about the coming great war in 

Europe did not differ appreciably from those of the contemporary 

novel-writers and millenarian expositors. In the Zion’s Watch Tower 

of February, 1885, he wrote: “Storm clouds are gathering thick 

over the old world. It looks as though a great European war is one 

of the possibilities of the near future.” 93 

Commenting on the prevailing world situation two years later he 

concluded, in the issue of February, 1887: “This all looks as though 

next Summer [ 1888] would see a war on foot which might engage 

every nation of Europe. ”94 In the issue of January 15, 1892, he had 

postponed the war to “about 1905,” at the same time stressing that 

this generally expected Great War had nothing to do with 1914 and the 

expectations attached to that date. In 1914 he expected—not a general 

European war—but the climax of the “battle of Armageddon” 

(which he thought had begun in 1874), when all the nations on 

earth would be crushed and be replaced by the kingdom of God. 

He wrote: 

The daily papers and the weeklies and the monthlies, religious 

and secular, are continually discussing the prospects of war in 

Europe. They note the grievances and ambitions of the various 

nations and predict that war is inevitable at no distant day, that it 

may begin at any moment between some of the great powers, and 

that the prospects are that it will eventually involve them all. . . . 

But, notwithstanding these predictions and the good reasons 

which many see for making them, we do not share them. That is, 

we do not think that the prospects of a general European war are 

so marked as is commonly supposed. . . . Even should a war or 

revolution break out in Europe sooner than 1905, we do not 

consider it any portion of the severe trouble predicted. . . . [The] 

ever-darkening war cloud will burst in all its destructive fury. This 

culmination we do not expect, however, before about 1905, as the 

events predicted will require about that time, notwithstanding the 

rapid progress in these directions now possible. 95 

92 Ibid., pp. 9, 10. 

93 Reprints, p. 720. 

94 Reprints, p. 899. 

95 Reprints, pp. 1354–1356. 

66


The generally expected Great War finally came in 1914. But 

probably none, and in any case not Charles Taze Russell and his 

followers, had predicted that it would come that year. The very 

different events that he and his associated “Bible Students” had 

attached to that date did not occur. Like the predictions of the 

many other contemporary millennarian writers, their predictions, 

too, were proved “definitely, completely, absolutely, false by the 

events.” 

To claim afterwards, as the Watch Tower Society repeatedly did 

up to 1993, that they and they alone “accurately,” “by God’s holy 

spirit,” had predicted the outbreak of the war in 1914 and other 

events, and that “all the politicians, religious leaders, and economic 

experts” had been “telling the people the opposite,” is 

demonstrably an outright lie. 

As explained earlier, some of those pretentious claims were 

finally, in 1993, withdrawn in the new book Jehovah’s Witnesses— 

Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom. The book was introduced at the district 

assemblies of Jehovah’s Witnesses that year as a “candid look” at 

the history of the movement. The admissions, however, usually are 

contextually surrounded by a minimum of background information 

which, moreover, is so apologetically slanted and warped that it 

often conceals more than it reveals. 

True, the Society finally admits that Russell took over his 

calculation of the Gentile times from Nelson H. Barbour, who had 

published it one year before Russell “in the August, September, 

and October 1875 issues of the Herald of the Morning.” 96 In the 

preceding paragraph the book even seeks to enlist the 19th-century 

expositors of the 2,520-year calculation as supporting the 1914 

date. This impression is further enhanced by the bold-typed 

statement to the left of the paragraph: “They could see that 1914 

was clearly marked by Bible prophecy.” The presentation of the 

history, however, is narrowly limited to a few carefully selected 

expositors, the calculations of whom are partially obscured, 

adjusted and arranged so as to create the impression that the 2,520- 

year calculation uniquely pointed forward to 1914. None of the many other 

terminal dates arrived at by expositors before Russell are mentioned. Thus, 

although John A. Brown is stated to have arrived at the 2,520 years 

“as early as 1823,” his particular application of the period is 

completely veiled and distorted in the subsequent sentences: 

96 Jehovah’s Witnesses—Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom (Brooklyn, New York: Watchtower 

Bible & Tract Society, 1993), p. 134. 

67


134 JEHOVAH’S WITNESSES -PROCLAIMERS OF GODS KINGDOM 

subtitle "Herald of Christ’s Presence," which appeared on the cover of 

Zion’s Watch Tower. 

Recognition of Christ’s presence as being invisible became an 

important foundation on which an understanding of many Bible 

prophecies would be built. Those early Bible Students realized that the 

presence of the Lord should be of primary concern to all true 

Christians. (Mark 13:33-37) They were keenly interested in the 

Master’s return and were alert to the fact that they had a responsibility 

to publicize it, but they did not yet clearly discern all the details. Yet, 

what God’s spirit did enable them to understand at a very early time 

was truly remarkable. One of these truths involved a highly significant 

date marked by Bible prophecy. 

End of the Gentile Times 

The matter of Bible chronology had long been of great interest to 

Bible students. Commentators had set out a variety of views on Jesus’ 

prophecy about "the times of the Gentiles" and the prophet Daniel’s 

record of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream regarding the tree stump that was 

banded for "seven times."—Luke 21:24, KJ, Dan. 4:10-17. 

They could see As early as 1823, John A. Brown, whose work was published in Lonthat 

1914 was don, England, calculated the seven times" of Daniel chapter 4 to be 2,520 

clearly marked by years in length. But he did not clearly discern the date with which the 

Bible prophecy prophetic time period began or when it would end. He did, however, 

connect these "seven times" with the Gentile Times of Luke 21:24. In 

1844, E. B. Elliott, a British clergyman, drew attention to 1914 as a 

possible date for the end of the "seven times" of Daniel, but he also 

set out an alternate view that pointed to the time of the French 

Revolution. Robett Seeley, of London, in 1849, handled the matter in 

a similar manner. At least by 1870, a publication edited by Joseph 

Seiss and associates and printed in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, was 

setting out calculations that pointed to 1914 as a significant date, 

even though the reasoning it contained was based on chronology that 

C. T. Russell later rejected. 

Then, in the August, September, and October 1875 issues of 

Herald of the Morning, N. H. Barbour helped to harmonize details 

that had been pointed out by others. Using chronology compiled by 

Christopher Bowen, a clergyman in England, and published by E. B. 

Elliott, Barbour identified the start of the Gentile Times with King 

Zedekiah’s removal from kingship as foretold at Ezekiel 21:25, 26, 

and he pointed to 1914 as marking the end of the Gentile Times. 

Early in 1876, C. T. Russell received a copy of Herald of the 

Morning. He promptly wrote to Barbour and then spent time with him 

in Philadelphia during the summer, discussing, among other things, 

prophetic time periods. Shortly thereafter, in an article entitled 

"Gentile Times: When Do 

Page 134 of Jehovah’s Witnesses—Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom (1993), the 

Watch Tower Society’s new book on the history of the movement. 

68


But he did not clearly discern the date with which the 

prophetic time period began or when it would end. He did, 

however, connect these ‘seven times’ with the Gentile Times of Luke 

21:24. 97 

Quite to the contrary, as shown in the chapter above, Brown 

expressly stated as his firm conviction that the 2,520-year period 

began in 604 B.C.E. and would end in 1917. Further, despite the 

Society’s italicized statement, Brown did not connect the 2,520 years 

with the Gentile times of Luke 21:24, because, as pointed out in 

the chapter above, he held the Gentile times referred to in this text 

to be 1,260 (lunar) years, not “seven times” of 2,520 years. (See 

footnote 20 above.) Both statements about Brown’s calculation, 

then, are demonstrably false. 

In addition to John A. Brown, the Society in the same paragraph 

refers to Edward B. Elliott and Robert Seeley, both of whom 

mentioned 1914 as one of the possible dates for the end of the 

“seven times.” Both of them, however, actually preferred 1793 (later 

changed to 1791 by Elliott) as the terminal date. 98 

Finally, an unnamed publication edited by Joseph Seiss and 

others is stated to have set out calculations that pointed to 1914 as 

a significant date, “even though the reasoning it contained was 

based on chronology that C. T. Russell later rejected.” 99 

The fact is, however, that this holds true of all four expositors 

mentioned by the Society. All of them used a chronology that dated the 

desolation of Jerusalem to 588 or 587 B.C.E. (not 606 B.C.E. as in 

Russell’s writings). Brown arrived at 1917 as the terminal date only 

because he reckoned the 2,520 years from the first year of 

Nebuchadnezzar (604 B.C.E.) instead of his 18th year, as did 

Barbour and Russell. And the other three arrived at 1914 by 

counting from Nebuchadnezzar’s accession- year, which they dated 

97 Ibid., p. 134. 

98 The Watch Tower Society gives no specific references. E. B. Elliott first published 

his calculations in Horae Apocalypticae, 1st ed. (London: Seeley, Burnside, and 

Seeley, 1844), vol. III, pp. 1429–1431. Robert Seeley published his calculations in 

An Atlas of Prophecy: Being the Prophecies of Daniel & St. John (London: Seeley’s, 

1849), p. 9. See also footnote 30 of chapter I. 

99 The unnamed publication is the The Prophetic Times magazine. The calculation was 

presented in the article “Prophetic Times. An Inquiry into the Dates and Periods of 

Sacred Prophecy,” written by an anonymous contributor and published in the 

issue of December, 1870, pp. 177–184. The author, on pages 178 and 179, 

presents 12 different starting-points for the times of the Gentiles, extending from 728 

to 598 B.C.E., thus arriving at 12 different terminal dates extending from 1792 to 

1922 C.E.! The year 1914 is the next to the last of these terminal dates. The 

calculation pointing to 1914 is counted from the accession-year of 

Nebuchadnezzar, which the author, like Elliott and Seeley, dates to 606 B.C.E. 

Thus he, too, followed a chronology that dates the destruction of Jerusalem to 588 

or 587 B.C.E., not 606 B.C.E. as in Russell’s writings or 607 B.C.E. as in later 

Watch Tower publications. 

69


to 606 B.C.E. (instead of 605 B.C.E., the date established by 

modern historians). 100 

Although all of them based their calculations on chronologies 

that were rejected by Russell and his followers, the Society claims 

that these expositors “could see that 1914 was clearly marked by 

Bible prophecy.” How they “could see” this “clearly” by using 

chronologies that the Society still holds to be false is certainly 

puzzling. Of course, for a reader to discover such inconsistent 

reasonings, he or she has to check the works of these expositors. 

The problem is that the Society’s authors commonly avoid giving 

specific references. This practice makes it virtually impossible for 

the great majority of readers to discover the subtle methods used to 

support indefensible interpretations and cover over embarrassing 

evidence. 

As just mentioned, the Society, contrary to earlier claims, 

concedes in the new book that the predictions attached to 1914 

failed. As was shown in the chapter above, the very specific and 

distinct predictions about 1914 were summarized in seven points 

on pages 76–78 of Vol. II of Millennial Dawn, originally published in 

1889. These predictions were there put forward in no uncertain 

terms. The discussion is teeming with words and phrases such as 

“facts,” “proof,” “Bible evidence,” and “established truth.” That 

1914 would see “the disintegration of the rule of imperfect men,” 

for instance, is stated to be “a fact firmly established by the 

Scriptures. 101 

What does the Society’s new history book do with the 

pretentious claims and the very positive language that originally 

encapsulated these predictions? They are totally smoothed over or 

concealed. Referring to the above-mentioned discussion of the 

Gentiles times in Vol. II of Millennial Dawn—but without quoting 

any of the actual statements made—the Society asks: “But what 

100 As shown in the chapter above, Barbour and Russell, too, started the Gentile 

times in 606 B.C.E., although this was held to be the date for the desolation of 

Jerusalem in the eighteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar. The 606 B.C.E. date is 

nowhere mentioned in the Society’s new book, probably because the Society 

today uses 607 B.C.E. as the starting-point. Reminding the readers of the earlier 

date, therefore, might only seem confusing at least to those who have never 

heard of it. How the Society in 1944 (in the book The Kingdom is at Hand, p. 175) 

managed to change the starting-point from 606 to 607) B.C.E. and still retain 

1914 as the terminal date has a strange history of its own, a history that has 

been recounted in the booklet The Watchtower Society and Absolute Chronology 

(Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada, 1981), authored by “Karl Burganger” (a pen name I 

used at that time). See also next chapter, pp. 77–84. 

101 The Time is at Hand (=Vol .II of Millennial Dawn, later called Studies in the 

Scriptures) Pittsburgh: Watch Tower Bible & Tract Society, 1889, pp. 76–102. 

70


would the end of the Gentile Times mean?” The surprising answer 

given is that the Bible Students “were not completely sure what 

would happen”! 

Although some of the predictions are briefly mentioned, the 

Society carefully avoids terming them “predictions” or 

“prophecies.” Russell and his associates never “predicted” or 

“foretold” anything, never claimed to present “proof” or 

“established truth.” They just “thought,” “suggested,” “expected,” 

and “earnestly hoped” that this or that “might” happen, but they 

“were not completely sure.” 102 Thus the predictions are wrapped 

up in language that completely masks the true nature of the 

aggressive doomsday message proclaimed to the world by the 

International Bible Students for over a quarter of a century before 

1914. Disguising the presumptuous predictions in such vague and 

unassuming words and phrases, of course, makes it easier to 

“humbly” concede that these failed. 

102 Jehovah’s Witnesses—Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom (1993), page 135. 

71

2 

I 

BIBLICAL AND SECULAR 

CHRONOLOGY 

N DEFENDING the date of 607 B .CE. as the time of the 

desolation of Jerusalem and the starting point for calculating the 

length of the Gentile times, representatives of the Watch Tower 

Society claim that they are relying on the Bible. Those who date the 

desolation to 587 or 586 B.C.E. are said to rely on secular sources 

rather than the Bible. The anonymous author of the “Appendix to 

chapter 14” of the book “Let Your Kingdom Come,” for instance, 

states: 

We are willing to be guided primarily by God’s Word rather 

than by a chronology that is based principally on secular evidence 

or that disagrees with the Scriptures. 1 

Such statements obviously intend to create the impression that 

those who reject the 607 B.C.E. date for the desolation of 

Jerusalem have no real faith in the Bible. But do such statements 

give a fair description of the matter? Or are they just sanctimonious 

disparagement, aimed at defaming the Christian character of those 

who disagree, not with the Scriptures, but with the Watch Tower 

Society’s datings? Or may it even be that the defenders of the 

Society’s chronology have themselves not really understood the 

true nature of Biblical chronology? 

The nature of the Biblical chronology 

Today, people read or use the terms B.C. and A.D. (corresponding 

to B.C.E. and C.E.) and generally give no thought to the origin of 

these designations. Actually, the “Christian era,” in which events 

1 ”Let Your Kingdom Come” (Brooklyn, New York: Watchtower Bible and Tract 

Society, 1981), p. 189. 

72

Biblical and Secular Chronology 73 

are dated in relation to the year of the birth of Christ, is a rather 

late construction. As is well established, the system was not 

introduced until the sixth century C.E. by the Roman monk and 

scholar Dionysius Exiguus. Another 500 years would pass, 

however, before this new era had been generally accepted as a 

dating system in the Catholic world. 

Since the Bible was written long before the time of Dionysius 

Exiguus, it does not, of course, give any dates according to our 

Christian era. Thus, although the Watch Tower Society dates the 

baptism of Jesus to 29 C.E., the 20th year of Artaxerxes I to 455 

B.C.E., the fall of Babylon to 539 B.C.E., and the desolation of 

Jerusalem to 607 B.C.E., none of these dates are found in the 

Bible. The Bible gives relative datings only. What does that imply? 

Consider this relevant example: In 2 Kings 25:2 the desolation 

of Jerusalem is dated to the “eleventh year of King Zedekiah,” the 

last king of Judah. Verse 8 additionally tells us that this occurred in 

the “nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon.” 

But when was that? How far from our own time was it? How 

many years before the Christian era did it happen? The fact is that 

the Bible gives no information whatsoever that, of itself, links up these datings 

with our Christian era. 

Similarly, the books of Kings and Chronicles tell about the kings 

who ruled in Israel and Judah from Saul, the first king, on to 

Zedekiah, the last one. We are told who succeeded whom, and for 

how many years each of them ruled. By summing up the lengths of 

reign from Saul to Zedekiah we can measure the approximate 

space of time (there are many uncertain points) between these two 

kings. In this way we find that the period of the Hebrew 

monarchies covered roughly 500 years. But still we have found no 

answer to the question: At what point on the stream of time did this period 

start and at what point did it end? 

If the Bible had gone on to give a continuous and unbroken 

series of regnal years from Zedekiah all the way down to the 

beginning of the Christian era, the question would have been 

answered. But Zedekiah was the last of the Jewish line of kings and 

his reign ended centuries before Christ’s coming. Nor does the 

Bible give any other information that directly identifies for us the 

length of the period from Zedekiah’s “eleventh year” (when 

Jerusalem was desolated) to the beginning of the Christian era. 

Thus we have a period of roughly 500 years, the period of the 

Hebrew monarchies, but we are not told how far from our time 

this period was and how it can be fixed to our Christian era.


If the Bible had preserved dated and detailed descriptions of 

astronomical events, such as solar and lunar eclipses, or the positions 

of the planets in relation to different stars and constellations, this 

would have made our problem easier. Modern astronomers, with 

their knowledge of the regular movements of the moon and the 

planets, are able to calculate the positions these heavenly bodies 

held on the starry sky thousands of years ago. But the fact is that 

the Bible provides no information of this kind. 

The Bible of itself, then, does not show how its chronological 

datings may be connected with our own era. A chronology that is 

in this sense “hanging in the air” is simply the type of chronology 

called a relative chronology. Only if the Biblical information supplied 

us with the exact distance from the time of Zedekiah up to our 

own era—either by the aid of a complete and coherent line of 

lengths of reign, or by detailed and dated astronomical 

observations—we would have had an absolute chronology, that is, a 

chronology that gives us the exact distance from the last year of 

Zedekiah to our own time. 2 It seems evident that the Bible writers 

themselves were not concerned about supplying this, their focus 

simply being on other matters. What source, then, can we look to 

to make the connection with our era reckoning? 

Is there a “Bible chronology” without secular sources? 

Despite the relative nature of the Biblical dates, it is nonetheless not 

impossible to date events mentioned in the Bible. If we were able 

to synchronize the chronology of the Bible with the chronology of 

another country, whose chronology in turn can be fixed to our 

Christian era, then it would be possible to convert the Bible’s 

relative chronology into an absolute chronology. This means, 

however, that we would have to rely on extra-Biblical, that is, on 

secular historical sources, in order to date events in the Bible. 

2 Dr. Michael C. Astour explains: “Absolute chronology means dating reigns, wars, 

treaties, destructions, rebuildings, and other events known from written and 

archaeological records, in terms of modem Western time reckoning, i.e., in years 

B.C.” (Hittite History and Absolute Chronology of the Bronze Age, Partille, Sweden: 

Paul Åströms förlag, 1989, p. 1.) Such a chronology is usually best established by 

the aid of recorded ancient astronomical observations. As the renowned expert on 

ancient astronomy, Professor Otto Neugebauer, puts it, “an ‘absolute chronology’ 

[is] a chronology which is based on astronomically fixed dates in contrast to a 

‘relative chronology’ which tells us only the length of certain intervals, e.g., the 

total of regnal years in a dynasty.’ — A History of Ancient Mathematical Astronomy, 

Book VI (Berlin-Heidelberg-New York: Springer-Verlag, 1975), p. 1071.


And we have no other alternative. If we want to know when, in 

relation to our own time, an event mentioned in the Bible took 

place—be it the date for the fall of Babylon, the date for the 

desolation of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, the date for the 

rebuilding of the temple in the reign of Darius I, or any other date 

whatever—then we are obliged to turn to the secular historical sources. This 

is the sober fact every Bible believer has to accept, whether he or 

she likes it or not. The simple truth is that—as relates to 

connecting with our Christian era reckoning—without secular sources 

there is no Bible chronology, no datings of Biblical events in terms of years 

“B.C.E.” or “C.E.” 

This also means, of course, that to speak of using the 

“chronology of the Bible” as a unilateral, independent timemeasurer 

by which the correctness of a certain date can be 

established, is simply to ignore reality. When, for instance, some 

Witnesses point to the fact that modern historians date the fall of 

Babylon to 539 B.C.E. and then claim that “the chronology of the 

Bible is in agreement with this date,” they show they have not really 

understood what the relative nature of the Biblical chronology 

actually implies .Where does the Bible assign a date for the fall of 

Babylon? A Witness might refer to Jeremiah’s prophecy of the 

“seventy years” leading up to Babylon’s fall. But on what date did 

those seventy years begin, so as to count forward to their end? 

There is none supplied. Since the Bible does not give any date at 

all, not even a specific relative date, for the fall of Babylon, the 

statement that the Bible “agrees” with the secular dating of this 

event to 539 B.C.E. is completely meaningless. 3 And it is equally 

3 According to secular sources Babylon was captured by Persian king Cyrus’ troops 

in the 17th year of Nabonidus, which was thus to become the “accession-year” of 

Cyrus. (For the Babylonian accession year system, see the Appendix for Chapter 

2.) Although the fall of Babylon is referred to several times in the Bible, the event is 

not dated to any specific regnal year, neither that of Nabonidus (who is not even 

mentioned) nor of Cyrus. Isaiah (chapters 13, 14, 21, 45, 47, 48) and Jeremiah 

(chapters 25, 27, 50, 51) both predicted the fall of Babylon, but neither of them 

gave any date for the event. Daniel, in chapter 5, verses 26–28, predicted that the 

fall of Babylon was imminent. Then, in verses 30 and 31, he states that “in that 

very night” Belshazzar (the son of Nabonidus) was killed and was succeeded by 

“Darius the Mede.” But who was “Darius the Mede”? The Watch Tower Society 

admits that the historical identification of this figure “is uncertain” The suggestion 

(of Professor D. J. Wiseman) that “Darius the Mede” is but another name for Cyrus 

himself is rejected. (Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 1, Brooklyn, New York: 

Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 1988, pp. 581–583.) Further, although Daniel 

6:28 mentions “the reign of Darius” and “the reign of Cyrus the Persian,” and 

although Daniel 9:1 mentions the “first year” of “Darius the Mede,” the Bible 

neither gives the 1ength of the reign of “Darius the Mede” nor does it indicate if his 

reign should be inserted between the fall of Babylon and the first year of Cyrus or 

not. Thus, although the Bible (in 2 Chronicles 36:22, 23 and Ezra 1:1–4) states 

that the Jewish exiles were released “in the first year of Cyrus,” it does not show 

how long after the fall of Babylon this occurred. The Bible, then, does not give even 

a relative date for the fall of Babylon.


meaningless and misleading to state that the secular date for the 

desolation of Jerusalem, 587 or 586 B.C.E., disagrees with the 

chronology of the Bible, since the absolute date for that event is 

not given in the Bible either. 

What of the 70 years of Jeremiah 25:11, 12 and 29:10, on which 

Witnesses rely so heavily in their chronology? Witnesses quite 

naturally hold to the Watch Tower Society’s claim that these 70 

years refer to the period of Jerusalem’s desolation, reckoned from 

the 18th year of Nebuchadnezzar to the return of the Jewish exiles 

in the 1st year of Cyrus (that is, his first full or regnal year, following 

his accession year, which began in 539 B.C.E.). As a result of this 

view, the time interval between the dates historians have 

established for these two events―587/86 and 538/37 B.C.E.— 

appears too short, by some 20 years. The Watch Tower Society, 

therefore, chooses to reject one of the two dates. They could reject 

the date for Nebuchadnezzar’s 18th year (587/86 B.C.E.) or reject 

the date for Cyrus’ first regnal year (538/37 B.C.E.). They reject the 

first date, 587/86 B.C.E. On what basis do they reject that date and 

not the other? 

There is no Biblical reason for this choice. As pointed out earlier, 

the Bible itself neither agrees nor disagrees with either of these two 

dates, dates stated in terms of the Christian era reckoning. The 

Bible, therefore, simply does not provide the means for deciding 

which of the two dates is the better one, in terms of being firmly 

established. On what grounds, then, should the choice be made— 

provided that the Society’s interpretation of the 70 years is correct? 

The most logical, sound and scholarly method would be to 

accept the date that is most clearly established by the extra-Biblical 

historical sources. This is because these sources do supply the data 

needed to link up with our Christian era reckoning. And, as will be 

demonstrated in the next two chapters, these sources show very 

definitely that, of the two dates just considered, the chronology of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s reign is much better established by astronomical 

and other documents than is the chronology of Cyrus’ reign. If a 

choice were really necessary, and a Bible-believing Christian were 

faced with choosing, the natural choice, then, should be to retain 

the 587/86 B .C.E. date and reject the 538/37 B.C.E. date. 

Yet the Watch Tower Society prefers the opposite choice. Since 

the reason for this is not because the Bible itself favors one of 

these dates over the other, and it is certainly not because the 

historical evidence does so, what is the real reason for their choice?


Loyalty to the Bible—or to a prophetic speculation? 

If, according to their claims, the 70-year period of Jeremiah’s 

prophecy really should be reckoned from the 18th year of 

Nebuchadnezzar to the 1st year of Cyrus , the Watch Tower 

Society should logically have started with 587/86 B.C.E. as 

historically the more reliable of the two dates. Counting 70 years 

forward from that date would point to 518/17 B.C.E. as the first 

year of Cyrus instead of 538/37. This would be’ as Biblical and 

actually more scholarly than to retain 538/37 B.C.E. and reject 

587/86 (the date having the stronger documentary and 

astronomical support). 

Why, then, does the Watch Tower Society reject 587/86 B.C.E. 

instead of rejecting 538/37? 

The answer is obvious. The 587/86 B.C.E. date is in direct 

conflict with the Watch Tower Society’s chronology for the “times 

of the Gentiles.” In that chronology, their 607 B.C.E. date for the 

desolation of Jerusalem is the indispensable starting-point. Without 

the date of 607 B.C.E. the Society could not arrive at 1914 C.E. as 

the ending point. And as this date is the very cornerstone of the 

prophetic claims and message of the Watch Tower organization, 

nothing is allowed to upset it, neither the Bible nor historical facts. At 

heart, therefore, it is neither a question of loyalty to the Bible nor 

loyalty to historical facts. The choice of date has quite another 

motive: Loyalty to a chronological speculation that has become a vital 

condition for the divine claims of the Watch Tower organization. 

In the next two chapters it will be demonstrated that the whole 

Neo-Babylonian chronology is firmly established by at least seventeen 

different lines of evidence. Thus the 587/86 date for the 18th year of 

Nebuchadnezzar (and the desolation of Jerusalem) and the 538/ 37 

date for the first year of Cyrus are both correct. That none of these 

dates are in conflict with the 70 years of Jeremiah (Jeremiah 25:11, 

12 and 29:10) will be demonstrated in a subsequent chapter. 

The collapse of the original starting-point 

To repeat: Without secular sources there is no absolute chronology for dating 

events in the Scriptures. The Watch Tower Society has itself had to 

yield to this inevitable, though embarrassing, fact. The very first 

thing the Society has been forced to do, therefore, in order to have 

any Bible chronology at all, is to turn to the secular sources and select a 

date on which its chronology can be based. The date they have 

chosen is the date historians have established for the fall of


Babylon, 539 B.C.E. This secular date, therefore, is the very 

foundation of what the Society presents as its “Bible chronology” 

Why did the Society choose this date as the basis for its 

chronology? And how did the historians arrive at this date? 

When Charles Taze Russell first adopted Nelson H. Barbour’s 

“Bible chronology,” 536 B.C.E.—not 539 B .CE.—was the secular 

basis on which that chronology had been established. This date was 

believed to be, not that of Babylon’s fall, but the first year of Cyrus. By 

adding the “seventy years” to 536 they got 606 B.C.E. as the date 

for the desolation of Jerusalem, and by subtracting 606 from 2,520 

(the supposed number of years in the Gentile times) they arrived at 

1914. 

Originally Barbour claimed that the 536 B.C.E. date was derived 

from the ancient kinglist known as “Ptolemy’s Canon. 4 In time, 

however, it was discovered that this was not the case. This kinglist 

not only points to 538 B.C.E. as the first full year of Cyrus, but also 

to 587 B.C.E. as the date for the 18th year of Nebuchadnezzar, the year of 

Jerusalem’s desolation. When these facts dawned upon Russell he 

rejected the kinglist and started to attack its supposed originator, 

Claudius Ptolemy. He still believed, however, that 536 B.C.E. was a 

generally accepted date for the first year of Cyrus, stating: 

All students of chronology may be said to be agreed that the 

first year of Cyrus was the year 536 before the beginning of 

our Anno Domini era. 5 

4 On page 194 of his book Three Worlds, or Plan of Redemption (Rochester, N.Y., 

1877), for instance, Barbour asserted: “The fact that the first year of Cyrus was 

B.C. 536, is based upon Ptolemy’s canon, supported by the eclipses by which the 

dates of the Grecian and Persian era have been regulated. And the accuracy of 

Ptolemy’s canon is now accepted by all the scientific and literary world.” 

5 Zion’s Watch Tower, May 15, 1896, pp. 104, 105, 113 (= Reprints, pp. 1975, 1980. 

Emphasis added). — It is true that many earlier Christian chronologers, including 

archbishop James Ussher and Sir Isaac Newton, dated the first year of Cyrus to 

536 instead of 538 B.C.E. The reason for this was their application of the “seventy 

years” of Jeremiah 25:11,12 and Daniel 9:2 to the period from the first year of 

Nebuchadnezzar to the capture of Babylon by Cyrus. This seemed to conflict with 

“Ptolemy’s Canon,” which gives only 66 years to this period (604–538 B.C.E.). To 

arrive at 70 years, Nebuchadnezzar’s first year was often moved back from 604 to 

606 B.C.E., while the first year of Cyrus was moved forward to 536 B.C.E. The two 

years from 538 to 536 B.C.E. were allotted to “Darius the Mede.” The discovery of 

the thousands of cuneiform tablets from the Neo-Babylonian era in the 1870’s 

completely overthrew these theories, as was pointed out already as far back as 

1876 by Mr. George Smith. (See S. M. Evers, “George Smith and the Egibi Tablets,” 

1raq, Vol. LV 1993, p. 113.)


As time went by, some Bible Students discovered that this 

statement was not true, either. In a private letter to Russell dated 

June 7, 1914, one of his closest associates, Paul S. L. Johnson, 

pointed out to him that nearly all historians held 538 B.C.E. to be 

the first year of Cyrus. “I have consulted a dozen encyclopedias,” 

he wrote, “and all except three give 538 B.C. as the date.” 6 Russell, 

however, ignored this information, and so did Joseph F. 

Rutherford, his successor as president of the Watch Tower Society. 

Not until 1944, in the book “The Kingdom Is at Hand,” did the 

Watch Tower Society finally abandon the 536 B.C.E. date. By 

steps, Cyrus’ first year was moved backwards, first to 537 B.CE. 

and then, five years later, to 538 B.C.E., the date pointed to by 

“Ptolemy’s Canon.” 7 

To retain 1914 as the termination date of the Gentile times, 

other “adjustments” had to be made. To begin with, even though 

the first year of Cyrus started in the spring of 538 B.C.E., the 

Watchtower argued that his edict permitting the Jews to return home 

from the exile (Ezra 1:1–4) was issued towards the end of his first 

regnal year, that is, early in 537 B.C.E. In that case the Jews 

departing from Babylon could not have reached Jerusalem until the 

autumn of that year. By adding 70 years to 537 the desolation of 

Jerusalem was then fixed to 607 B.C.E. instead of 606. Next, the 

fact that no “zero year” is included at the beginning of our 

Christian era was finally acknowledged. 8 So from the autumn of 

607 B.C.E. to the beginning of our era was only 606 years and 

three months; and if this period is subtracted from the 2,520 years, 

1914 is still arrived at as the termination date. Hence, three separate 

“errors” were made to cancel each other out, and the upshot was 

the same! Each adjustment was made with the retention of 1914 as 

its goal. 

Yet, to have the secular basis of the Watch Tower Society’s 

“Bible chronology” moved around in this arbitrary way was hardly 

confidence-inspiring. For the future, therefore, Cyrus’ first regnal 

year (538 B.C.E.) was not stressed as the “firmly established” 

starting-point. Instead, the stress was transferred to the date 

historians had established for the fall of Babylon, 539 B.C.E. This 

6 This letter was published as an Appendix to Paul S. L. Johnson’s reprint of the 

second volume of Studies in the Scriptures (Philadelphia, PA., U.S.A., 1937), pp. 

367–382. See especially p. 369. 

7 ”The Kingdom Is at Hand” (Brooklyn, New York: Watchtower Bible and Tract 

Society, 1944), p. 175; The Watchtower, Nov. 1, 1949, p. 326. 

8 This problem had been noted as early as in 1904, but the error had never been 

corrected. See The Watch Tower of December 1, 1912, p.377 (=Reprints, pp.5141, 

5142). See also above, page 53.


date was soon to be termed an “absolute date” in the Watch 

Tower publications. But why was this particular date viewed as an 

“absolute date”? 

539 B.C.E.—the “Absolute date for the Hebrew 

Scriptures”? 

At first, beginning in 1952, the Watch Tower Society explained that 

the date 539 B.C.E. for the fall of Babylon had been “firmly 

established” by the cuneiform tablet known as the Nabonidus 

Chronicle. 9 Evidently for this reason it was felt that this date could 

be used as the new basis for the Society’s B.C.E. chronology. In the 

next two decades, therefore, the year 539 B.C.E. was not only 

described as an “absolute date,” but as “the outstanding Absolute date 

for the B.C. period of the Hebrew Scriptures.” 10 What is the 

reality in this regard? Does the historical evidence justify this 

impressive language and what does it show as to the Watch Tower 

writers’ understanding of secular chronology? 

The Nabonidus Chronicle: This cuneiform document dates 

the fall of Babylon to the “16th day” of “the month of Tashritu,” 

evidently in the 17th year of Nabonidus. Unfortunately, the text is 

damaged, and the words for “17th year” are illegible. But even if 

these words had been preserved, the chronicle would not have told 

us anything more than that Babylon was captured on the 16th day 

of Tishri (Babylonian Tashritu) in Nabonidus’ 17th year. This 

information in itself cannot be translated to 539 B.C.E. It requires 

additional secular evidence to place Nabonidus’ 17th year within our 

era reckoning and allow for our assigning it a date within that 

reckoning. 

In spite of this, Watch Tower publications continued to give the 

impression that the Nabonidus Chronicle of itself fixed the absolute 

date for the fall of Babylon. 11 Not until 1971, in an article entitled 

“Testimony of the Nabonidus Chronicle,” was it finally conceded 

that this tablet did not fix the year for the fall of Babylon. Quoting 

9 See The Watchtower of May 1, 1952, p. 271. “This date,” said The Watchtower of 

February 1, 1955, on page 94, “is made Absolute by reason of the archaeological 

discovery and deciphering of the famous Nabunaid Chronicle, which itself gives a 

date for the fall of Babylon and which figure specialists have determined equals 

October 13, 539 B.C., according to the Julian calendar of the Romans.” 

10 The Watchtower, February 1, 1955, p. 94. (Emphasis added.) The book “All 

Scripture Is Inspired by God and Beneficial” (Brooklyn, N.Y.: Watchtower Bible and 

Tract Society of New York, Inc., 1963) similarly designated 539 B.C.E. as the 

“Absolute Date for the Hebrew Scriptures.” (p. 282) 

11 The Watchtower of August 15, 1968, p. 490, for instance, stated: “The fixing of 539 

B.C.E. as the year when this historical event occurred is based on a stone 

document known as the Nabonidus (Nabunaid) Chronicle.” (Emphasis added.) 

Compare also The Watchtower of May 1, 1968,p. 268.


the date given in the chronicle (the 16th day of Tashritu), the writer 

of the article frankly states: “But does the Nabonidus Chronicle of 

itself provide the basis for establishing the year for this event? 

No.” 12 

Although the principal witness in support of the “absolute date 

for the Hebrew Scriptures” was thus retracted, the Society was not 

prepared to make yet another change in the secular basis of its 

“Bible chronology.” Other witnesses, therefore, had to be searched 

out and summoned to the stand. In the very same Watchtower article 

quoted above, a reference was made to two new sources which in 

the future would “sustain” the absolute date 539 B.C.E.: 

Also other sources, including Ptolemy’s Canon, point to the 

year 539 B.C.E. as the date for Babylon’s fall. For example, ancient 

historians such as Diodorus, Africanus and Eusebius show that Cyrus’ 

first year as king of Persia corresponded to Olympiad 55, year 1 

(560/59 B.C.E.), while Cyrus’ last year is placed at Olympiad 62, year 

2 (531/30 B.C.E.). . . . Cuneiform tablets give Cyrus a rule of nine 

years over Babylon. This would harmonize with the accepted date 

for the start of his rule over Babylon in 539 B.C.E. 13 

Thus the new validating sources consisted of (1) Ptolemy’s Canon, 

and (2) dates from the Greek Olympiad Era quoted by ancient historians. 

Can any of these sources establish 539 B.C.E. as an “absolute date” 

to which the Biblical chronology may be firmly fixed? 

Ptolemy’s Canon: As was shown earlier, Russell at first 

buttressed his chronology by reference to Ptolemy’s Canon. But 

when he discovered that the 536 B.C.E. date for Cyrus’ first year 

was not supported by it, he rejected the Canon. And although the 

Watch Tower finally pushed back Cyrus’ 1st year to 538 B.C.E. in 

agreement with Ptolemy’s Canon, the Society’s chronology is still in 

conflict with the Canon at other points. 

The sum total of the lengths of reign given by the Canon for the 

Neo-Babylonian kings prior to Cyrus, for example, point to 587 

12 The Watchtower, May 15, 1971,p. 316 (emphasis added). When it was discovered 

that the Nabonidus Chronicle did not establish 539 B.C.E. as an “absolute date,” 

this term was dropped in the Watch Tower publications. In Aid to Bible 

Understanding, 539 is called “a pivotal point” (p. 333), a term also used in the 

1988 revised edition. (Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 1, p. 458) At other times it is 

just stated that “historians calculate” or “hold” that Babylon fell in 539 B.C.E.— 

See “Let Your Kingdom Come” (Brooklyn, N.Y.: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 

1981), pp. 136, 186. 

13 The Watchtower, May 15, 1971, p. 316. (Emphasis added.) This statement was also 

included in the Watch Tower Society’s Bible dictionary, Aid to Bible Understanding 

(1971), p. 328. It is still retained in the revised 1988 edition (Insight on the 

Scriptures, Vol. 1, p. 454).


B.C.E., not 607 B.C.E., as the date for the desolation of Jerusalem 

in Nebuchadnezzar’s 18th regnal year. Further, the Watch Tower 

Society also rejects the figures given by Ptolemy’s Canon for the 

reigns of Xerxes and Artaxerxes I. 14 To use the Canon in support 

of the 539 B.C.E. date while at the same time rejecting its chronology 

for periods falling prior to and after this date would be totally 

inconsistent. 

Evidently realizing this, the Watch Tower Society in the very 

next year once again rejected Ptolemy’s Canon, declaring that “the 

very purpose of the Canon makes absolute dating by means of it 

impossible.” 15 If this were true, the Society could not, of course, 

use the Canon in support of the 539 B.C.E. date. 

With Ptolemy’s Canon thus removed, the secular basis of the 

Society’s “Bible chronology” now wholly depended on the 

trustworthiness of the second witness, the Greek Olympiad Reckoning. 

How about this era reckoning? In what way does it fix Babylon’s 

fall to 539 B.C.E., and to what an extent can Olympic dates quoted 

by ancient historians be relied upon? 

The Olympiad Era: The first year assigned to this era is 776 

B.C.E. This year, therefore, is designated as “O1. I,1 ,” that is, the 

first year of the first Olympiad. Now this does not mean that the 

first Olympic games took place in 776 B.C.E. Ancient sources 

indicate that these games began to be held much earlier. Nor does 

it mean that already back in 776 B.C.E. the Greeks had started an 

era founded upon the Olympic games. As a matter of fact no reference 

to the Olympiad era may be found in all ancient literature until the third 

century B.C.E.! As Professor Elias J. Bickerman points out, “the 

14 According to Ptolemy’s Canon, Xerxes ruled for 21 years (485–464 B.C.E.) and 

Artaxerxes I for 41 years (464–423 B.C.E.). In order to have the 20th year of 

Artaxerxes I fixed to 455 instead of 445 B.C.E., the Society sets the beginning of 

his reign 10 years earlier, thus making it 51 years instead of 41. As this would 

displace all dates prior to Artaxerxes I by 10 years, including the date for the fall of 

Babylon, the Society has subtracted 10 years from Xerxes’ sole reign, making it 11 

years instead of 21! The only reason for these changes is that they are necessitated 

by the Society’s particular application of the “seventy weeks” of Daniel 9:24–27. 

This application was originally suggested by the Jesuit theologian Dionysius 

Petavius in De Doctrina Tempo rum, a work published in 1627. Many others picked 

up the idea, including the Anglican archbishop James Ussher in the same century. 

In 1832 the German theologian E. W. Hengstenberg included a lengthy defense of 

it in his well-known work Christologie des Alten Testaments. Since then, however, 

the idea has been completely demolished by archaeological findings. This has been 

demonstrated in a separate study published on the web: 

http://user.tninet.se/~oof408u/fkf/english/artaxerxes.htm 

For the readers convenience, this study has been added at the end of the present 

book. 

15 Awake!, May 8, 1972, p. 26.


numbering of Olympiads was introduced by Timaeus or by 

Eratosthenes” 16 And Dr. Alan E. Samuel specifies: “The Olympiad 

reckoning system, originated by Philistus, was subsequently used in 

an historical context by Timaeus, and from then on we find 

historical chronologies based on Olympiads.” 17 Timaeus Sicilus 

wrote a history of Sicily, his native country, in 264 B.C.E., and 

Eratosthenes, a librarian at the famous library in Alexandria in 

Egypt, published his Chronographiae some decades later. 

The Olympiad reckoning, then, like the Christian era, was 

introduced more than 500 years after the year that was chosen as the 

starting-point for that era! How did the Greek historians manage to 

fix the date for the first Olympiad as well as other dates (for 

example, the first year of Cyrus) hundreds of years later? What kind 

of sources were at their disposal? 

They studied lists of victors in the quadrennial games kept at 

Olympia. But unfortunately such lists had not been kept 

continuously all the way from the beginning. As Dr. Samuel points 

out, the first list was “drawn up by Hippias at the end of the fifth 

century B.C.,” that is, around 400 B.C.E. 18 “By Hellenistic times 

the list of victors was complete and reasonably consistent and the 

framework for chronology was established and accepted.” 19 But 

was the list reliable? Samuel continues: “Whether all this was right, 

or whether events were assigned to years correctly, is another 

matter.” Pointing out that “the shrewd Plutarch [c. 46–c. 120 C.E.] 

had his doubts,” he goes on to caution that “we too should be very 

dubious about chronographic evidence from Olympiads much 

before the middle or beginning of the fifth century [i.e., before 450 

or 500 B.C.E.]” 20 

The Watch Tower Society’s confidence in the Olympiad 

reckoning is even more illusory, however. This is because, while 

they accept the Olympiad dates given by ancient historians for the 

reign of Cyrus, they reject the Olympiad dates given by these 

historians for the reign of Artaxerxes I, despite the fact his reign 

fell much closer to our time. Thus, when Julius Africanus, in his 

Chronography (published c. 221/22 C.E.), dates the 20th year of 

16 Elias J. Bickerman, Chronology of the Ancient World, revised edition (London: 

Thames and Hudson, 1980), p. 75. 

17 Alan E. Samuel, Greek and Roman Chronology (München: C. H. Beck’sche 

Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1972), p. 189. 

18 A. E. Samuel, op. cit., p. 189. 

19 1bid., p. 190. 

20 Ibid., p. 190. Bickerman (op. cit., p. 75) agrees: “The trustworthiness of the earlier 

part of the list of Olympic victors, which begins in 776 BC, is doubtful.”


Artaxerxes to the “4th year of the 83rd Olympiad,” corresponding 

to 445 B.C.E., this date is rejected by the Watch Tower Society in 

preference of 455 B.C.E., as was noted earlier (footnote 14). 21 As in 

the case of Ptolemy’s Canon, then, the Society again uses a witness 

that at other times is completely rejected, and this for the sole 

reason that in those areas the evidence is unfavorable to its 

teachings. 

Aside from the Watch Tower Society’s inconsistency, the 

Olympiad datings preserved by Diodorus, Africanus and Eusebius 

indicating 539 B.C.E. to be the date for the fall of Babylon, cannot 

alone be used to establish that date as an absolute date on which 

the chronology of the Hebrew Scriptures can be based. This is due 

to the simple fact, already presented, that the Olympiad reckoning 

system was not actually instituted until the third century B.C.E.— 

or three centuries after the fall of Babylon. 

Astronomy and the year 539 B.C.E. 

The preceding discussion of the Society’s fruitless attempts to 

establish a secular basis for its particular “Bible chronology” 

epitomizes the content of a booklet published in 1981, The Watch 

Tower Society and Absolute Chronology. 22 Perhaps it was this exposure 

that—directly or indirectly-incited the Society’s writers to make 

another attempt to establish the 539 B.C.E. date. At any rate, a new 

discussion of the date was published in 1988 in the Society’s 

revised Bible dictionary, Insight on the Scriptures, in which the authors 

now try to fix the date astronomically. 

As explained earlier (in footnote 2), an absolute chronology is 

usually best established with the assistance of astronomically-fixed 

dates. In the 1870s and 1880s, excavations in Babylonia unearthed 

a great number of cuneiform texts containing descriptions of 

astronomical events dating from the Babylonian, Persian and 

Greek eras. These texts provide numerous absolute dates from 

these periods. 

The most important astronomical text from the Neo-Babylonian 

era is a so-called astronomical “diary,” a record of about thirty 

astronomical observations dated to the 37th year of 

Nebuchadnezzar. This tablet, which is kept in the Berlin Museum 

(where it is designated VAT 4956), establishes 568/67 B.C.E. as 

21 The Ante-Nicene Fathers, ed. A. Roberts and J. Donaldson, Vol. VI (Grand Rapids, 

Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., reprint of 1978), p. 135. 

22 Karl Burganger, The Watch Tower Society and Absolute Chronology (Lethbridge, 

Canada: Christian Koinonia International, 1981), pp. 7–20. See above, p.70, note 

100.


the absolute date for the 37th year of Nebuchadnezzar. This date 

obviously implies that his 18th year, during which he desolated 

Jerusalem, corresponds to 587/86 B.C.E. That is 20 years later than 

the 607 B.C.E. date assigned to that event by the Watch Tower 

Society. A detailed discussion of this and other astronomical texts 

is given in chapter four. 

The Watch Tower Society’s concern, then, is somehow to 

bypass the use of any such unfavorable ancient text and find a way 

to establish the date of 539 B.C.E. independently of it, thereby 

avoiding conflict with the corollary evidence the text supplies that 

undermines a 607 B.C.E. date for Jerusalem’s fall. To what 

astronomical evidence do they resort? 

Strm. Kambys. 400: The astronomical text, designated Strm. 

Kambys. 400, is the text now used by the Watch Tower Society to 

establish the 539 B.C.E. date. It is a tablet dated to the seventh year 

of Cambyses, the son of Cyrus. 23 Referring to two lunar eclipses 

mentioned in the text—eclipses which modern scholars have 

“identified with the lunar eclipses that were visible at Babylon on 

July 16, 523 B.C.E., and on January 10, 522 B.C.E.,”—the Society 

concludes: 

Thus, this tablet establishes the seventh year of Cambyses II as 

beginning in the spring of 523 B.C.E. This is an astronomically 

confirmed date? 24 

To what does this lead? If 523/22 B .C.E. was the seventh year 

of Cambyses, his first year must have been 529/28 B.C.E. and the 

preceding year, 530/29 B.C.E., must have been the last year of his 

predecessor, Cyrus. To arrive at the date for the fall of Babylon, 

however, we also need to know the length of Cyrus’ reign. For this, 

the Society is forced to accept the information found in another 

type of cuneiform texts, the contract tablets, that is, dated business 

and administrative documents. Of these they state: 

The latest tablet dated in the reign of Cyrus II is from the 5th 

month, 23rd day of his 9th year.... As the ninth year of Cyrus II as 

king of Babylon was 530 B.C.E., his first year according to that 

reckoning was 538 B.C.E. and his accession year was 539 B.C.E. 25 

23 This text, which is designated Strm. Kambys. 400, is not exactly a “diary” in the 

strict sense, although it is closely related to this group of texts. 

24 Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 1 (Brooklyn, New York: Watchtower Bible and Tract 

Society of New York, Inc., 1988), p. 453. 

25 Ibid., p. 453.


To establish the date 539 B.C.E., then, the Society unreservedly 

accepts several ancient secular sources: (1) a Babylonian 

astronomical tablet, and (2) Babylonian contract tablets dated to 

the reign of Cyrus. Yet, on the following pages of the same article 

(pages 454–456) other documents of the very same type-astronomical 

texts and contract tablets-are rejected because of their support for the date 

587 B.C.E. for the destruction of Jerusalem! 

If the Society’s criticism of these astronomical diaries (mainly 

their being later copies of an original) were valid, that criticism 

would apply with equal force to their favored Strm. Kambys. 400. 

Like VAT 4956, Strm. Kambys. 400 is a copy of an earlier original. 

In fact, it may hardly even be termed a copy. The eminent expert 

on astronomical texts, F. X. Kugler, pointed out as early as 1903 

that this tablet is only partly a copy. The copyist was evidently 

working from a very defective text, and therefore tried to fill in the 

lacunae or gaps in the text by his own calculations. Thus only a 

portion of Strm. Kambys. 400 at best contains observations. The rest 

are additions by a rather unskilled copyist from a much later 

period. Kugler commented that “not one of the astronomical texts I 

know of offers so many contradictions and unsolved riddles as Strm. Kambys. 

400.” 26 

By contrast, VAT 4956 is one of the best preserved diaries. 

Although it is also a later copy, experts agree that it is a faithful 

reproduction of the original. 

There is some evidence that the lunar eclipses shown on Strm. 

Kambys. 400, referred to in the book Insight on the Scriptures were 

calculated rather than observed. 27 The point here made, though, is 

not the validity or lack of validity of those particular observations, 

but that, while applying certain criteria as a basis for rejecting the 

26 Franz Xaver Kugler, “Eine rätselvolle astronomische Keilinschrift (Strm. Kambys. 

400),” Zeitschrift für Assyriologie, Vol. 17 (Strassburg: Verlag von Karl J. Trübner, 

1903), p. 203. For a transcription and translation of the text, see F. X. Kugler, 

Sternkunde und Stemdienstin Babel, Buch I (Münsterin Westfalen: 

Aschendorffsche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1907), pp. 61–75. 

27 Dr. John M. Steele summarizes the present scholarly view of Strm. Kambys. 400 

in the following words: “It is also unwise to base any conclusions concerning the 

Babylonian records on this tablet alone, since it does not fall into any of the 

common categories of text. In particular, it is not certain whether this text 

contains observations or calculations of the phenomena it records.... There is also 

debate concerning whether the two lunar eclipses were observed or calculated.”— 

John M. Steele, Observations and Predictions of Eclipse Times by Early 

Astronomers (= Archimedes, Vol. 4. Dordrecht/Boston/ London: Kluwer Academic 

Publishers, 2000), p. 98.


evidence of VAT 4956, the Watch Tower Society does not let the 

same criteria affect its acceptance of Strm. Kambys. 400 because it views 

this document as giving apparent support to its claims. This 

repeated inconsistency results from the same “hidden agenda” of 

seeking to protect a historically unsupported date. 

Actually, to fix the date for the fall of Babylon, it is much safer 

to start with the reign of Nebuchadnezzar and count forward, 

instead of beginning with the reign of Cambyses and counting 

backward. The date 539 B.C.E. for the fall of Babylon was, in fact, 

first determined this way, as pointed out by Dr. R. Campbell 

Thompson in The Cambridge Ancient History: 

The date 539 for the Fall of Babylon has been reckoned from 

the latest dates on the contracts of each king in this period, 

counting from the end of Nabopolassar’s reign in 605 B.C., viz., 

Nebuchadrezzar, 43: Amel-Marduk, 2: Nergal-shar-usur, 4: 

Labashi-Marduk (accession only): Nabonidus, 17 = 66. 28 

The Watch Tower Society, however, accepts only the end product 

of this reckoning (539 B.C.E.), but rejects the reckoning itself and 

its starting point, because these contradict the date 607 B.C.E. The 

Society rejects the astronomical texts in general and VAT 4956 in 

particular; on the other hand, it is forced to accept the most 

problematic one—Strm. Kambys. 400. Surely, it would be difficult to 

find a more striking example of inconsistent, misleading 

scholarship. 

As has been demonstrated above, 539 B.C.E. is not a logical 

starting-point for establishing the date for the desolation of 

Jerusalem. The most reliable dates in this period (in the 6th century 

B.C.E.) that may be established as absolute fall much earlier, within 

the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, a reign that is directly fixed to our 

era by VAT 4956 and other astronomical texts. 

Further, the Bible provides a direct synchronism between the reign 

of Nebuchadnezzar and the desolation of Jerusalem. As pointed 

out earlier, 2 Kings 25:8 explicitly states that this desolation 

occurred in the “nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar.” 29 By 

28 R. Campbell Thompson, “The New Babylonian Empire,” The Cambridge Ancient 

History, ed. J.B. Bury, S. A. Cook, F. E. Adcock, Vol. III (Cambridge: Cambridge 

University Press, 1925), p. 224, ftn. 1. 

29 The “19th” year here evidently corresponds to the “18th” year according to the 

Babylonian system of reckoning the regnal years of kings. In Assyria and 

Babylonia, the year in which a king came to power was reckoned as his 

“accession-year,” while his first year always started on Nisan 1, the first day of the 

next year. As will be discussed later, Judah at this time did not apply the 

“accession-year system,” but counted the accession-year as the first year. See the 

Appendix for Chapter 2.


contrast, no such direct synchronism is given in the Bible for the 

fall of Babylon. 30 

But this is not all. The lengths of reigns of the Neo-Babylonian 

kings (as quoted from the contract tablets by Dr. R. Thompson 

above) from the first king, Nabopolassar, to the last one, 

Nabonidus, may be firmly established in a number of different 

ways. In fact, the chronology of this period may be established by 

at least seventeen different lines of evidence! This evidence will be 

presented in the next two chapters. 

30 See earlier footnote 3.

3 

P 

THE LENGTH OF REIGNS OF 

THE NEO-BABYLONIAN KINGS 

EOPLE MAY believe the most peculiar ideas, not because 

there is any evidence to show that they are true, but because 

there is little or no evidence to show that they are false. For many 

centuries people believed that the earth was flat, simply because 

this view could not easily be tested and disproven. Many ideas that 

have been tied to prophecies in the Bible also definitely belong to 

this category. These clearly include some appended to Jesus’ 

statement about the “times of the Gentiles” at Luke 21:24. 

For example, the Bible nowhere explicitly states: 

1) that Jesus, in speaking of these “Gentile times,” had in mind 

the “seven times” of Nebuchadnezzar’s madness mentioned 

in the book of Daniel, chapter 4; 

2) that these “seven times” were seven years; 

3) that these “years” were not ordinary Babylonian calendar 

years, but “prophetic years” of 360 days each, and therefore 

should be summed up as 2,520 days; 

4) that these 2,520 days not only applied to the period of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s madness, but also would have a greater 

fulfillment; 

5) that in this greater fulfillment days should be counted as 

years, so that we get a period of 2,520 years; and 

6) that this 2,520-year period started when Nebuchadnezzar, in 

his 18th regnal year, desolated the city of Jerusalem. 

None of these six assumptions can be verified by clear Biblical 

statements. They are, in fact, nothing but a chain of haphazard guesses. 

Yet, since the Bible does not discuss or even mention any of these 

ideas, it nowhere explicitly says they are false either. 

However, when it is further claimed (7) that Nebuchadnezzar’s 

desolation of Jerusalem took place in 607 B.C.E., we have reached 

a point in the train of thought that can be tested and disproven. 

89


This is because the chronology of the Neo-Babylonian period does 

not fall within the area of unverifiable assumptions. 

As will be demonstrated in this and the subsequent chapter, the 

length of the Neo-Babylonian period has been firmly established 

today by at least seventeen different lines of evidence, fourteen of 

which will be discussed in some detail in these two chapters. 

In the previous chapter it was shown that the validity of the 

Watch Tower Society’s prophetic interpretation of the 1914 date is 

intimately connected with the length of the Neo-Babylonian 

period. 1 That period ended when Babylon was captured by the 

armies of the Persian king Cyrus in 539 B.C.E., an acknowledged, 

reliable date. 

In the first year of his reign over Babylon, Cyrus issued an edict 

which permitted the Jews to return to Jerusalem. (2 Chronicles 

36:22, 23; Ezra 1:1–4) According to the Watch Tower Society this 

ended the seventy-year period mentioned at Jeremiah 25:11, 12; 

29:10; Daniel 9:2, and 2 Chronicles 36:21. 

If, as the Society maintains, the Jewish remnant returned to 

Jerusalem in 537 B.C.E., the period of Babylonian domination 

would have begun seventy years earlier, or in 607 B.C.E. 2 And 

1 The term “Neo-Babylonian” usually refers to the period that began with the reign of 

Nabopolassar (dated to 625–605 B.C.E.) and ended with Nabonidus (555–539 

B.C.E.). It should be noticed, however, that many scholars use the term “Neo- 

Babylonian” of a more extended period. The Assyrian Dictionary (eds. I. J. Gelb et 

al., Chicago: Oriental Institute, 1956—), for example, starts the period in 1150 

B.C.E. and ends it somewhere in the fourth century B.C.E. In the present work the 

term is confined to the Babylonian dynasty that began with Nabopolassar and 

ended with Nabonidus. 

2 The first year of Cyrus extended from the spring (Nisan 1) of 538 to the spring of 537 

B.C.E. If Ezra followed the Jewish method of counting the accession-year as the 

first year, he may have reckoned 539/38 as the first year of Cyrus. However that 

may be, the evidence is that Cyrus issued his edict not long after the fal1 of 

Babylon. The so-called Cyrus Cylinder shows that Cyrus, soon after the conquest 

of Babylon, issued a decree that allowed the different peoples that had been 

deported to Babylonia to return to their respective home countries. (James B. 

Pritchard [ed.], Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament [ANET], 

Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1950,p. 316.) Most likely the 

edict permitting the Jews to return to Jerusalem was a part of this general release 

of exiled peoples. As shown by the book of Ezra, the Jews who responded to the 

edict immediately began to organize themselves for the homeward journey (Ezra 

1:5–2:70), and in “the seventh month” (Tishri, corresponding to parts of September 

and October) they had settled in their home cities. (Ezra 3:1) The context seems to 

imply that this was still in the “first year of Cyrus” (Ezra 1:1–3:1). Most authorities, 

therefore, conclude that this was in the autumn of 538 B.C.E. and not in 537 as 

the Watch Tower Society insists. (See for example Dr. T. C. Mitchell’s discussion in 

The Cambridge Ancient History, 2nd ed., Vol. III:2, Cambridge: Cambridge 

University Press, 1991, pp. 430–432; also the thorough discussion of the 

historicity of Cyrus’ edict by Elias Bickerman in Studies in Jewish and Christian 

History, Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1976, pp. 72–108.) The Watch Tower Society, however, 

cannot accept the 538 B.C.E. date for the return, as that would move the 

beginning of their seventy-year period back to 608 B.C.E. This, of course, would 

destroy their Gentile times calculation.

The Length of Reigns of the Neo-Babylonian Kings 91 

since the Watch Tower Society holds this seventy-year period to be 

a period of complete desolation of Judah and Jerusalem, we are told 

that it was in the year 607 B.C.E. that Nebuchadnezzar destroyed 

Jerusalem, in his eighteenth regnal year. (2 Kings 25:8; Jeremiah 

52:12, 29) This event, it is assumed, started the 2,520 years, called 

the Gentile times, beginning in the year 607 B.C.E. 

This starting-point, however, is incompatible with a number of 

historical facts.* 

A. ANCIENT HISTORIANS 

Up to the latter part of the nineteenth century the only way to 

determine the length of the Neo-Babylonian period was by 

consulting ancient Greek and Roman historians. Those historians 

lived hundreds of years after the Neo-Babylonian period, and 

unfortunately their statements are often contradictory. 3 

Those held to be the most reliable are 1) Berossus and 2) the 

compiler(s) of the kinglist commonly known as Ptolemy’s Canon, 

sometimes also, and more correctly, referred to as the Royal Canon. 

It seems appropriate to begin our discussion with a brief 

presentation of these two historical sources since, although neither 

of them by themselves provides conclusive evidence for the length of 

the Neo-Babylonian period, their ancient testimony certainly merits 

consideration. 

3 These ancient historians include Megasthenes (3rd century B.C.E.), Berossus (c. 250 

B.C.E.), Alexander Polyhistor (1st century B.C.E.), Eusebius Pamphilus (c. 260–340 

C.E.), and Georgius Syncellus (last part of the 8th century C.E.). For a convenient 

overview of the figures given by these ancient historians, see Raymond Philip 

Dougherty, Nabonidus and Belshazzar (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1929), 

pp. 8–10; cf. also Ronald H. Sack, Images of Nebuchadnezzar (Selinsgrove: 

Susquehanna University Press; London and Toronto: Associated University Press, 

1991), pp. 31–44. 

* What follows in this and the subsequent chapter, in many cases involves information 

of a technical nature, accompanied by detailed documentation. While this 

contributes to the firm foundation of the dates established, it is also made 

necessary by attempts on the part of some sources to counteract the historical 

evidence, offering information that has an appearance of validity, even of 

scholarliness, but which, on examination, proves invalid and often superficial. 

Some readers may find the technica1 data difficult to follow. Those who do not feel 

they need all the details may turn directly to the summaries at the end of each of 

these two chapters. These summaries give a general idea of the discussion, the 

evidence presented, and the conclusions drawn from it.


A-1: Berossus 

Berossus was a Babylonian priest who lived in the third century 

B.C.E. 

In about 281 B.C.E. he wrote a history of Babylonia in Greek 

known as Babyloniaca or Chaldaica which he dedicated to the 

Seleucid king Antiochus I (281–260 B.C.E.), whose vast empire 

included Babylonia. Later Berossus abandoned Babylon and settled 

on the Ptolemaic island of Cos. 4 

His writings, unfortunately, have been lost, and all that is known 

about them comes from the twenty-two quotations or paraphrases 

of his work by other ancient writers and from eleven statements 

about Berossus made by classical, Jewish, and Christian writers. 5 

The longest quotations deal with the reigns of the Neo- 

Babylonian kings and are found in Flavius Josephus’ Against Apion 

and in his Antiquities of the Jews, both written in the latter part of the 

first century C.E.; in Eusebius’ Chronicle and in his Preparation for the 

Gospel, both from the early fourth century C.E., and in other late 

works. 6 It is known that Eusebius quoted Berossus indirectly via 

the Greco-Roman scholar Cornelius Alexander Polyhistor (first 

century B.C.E.). 

Although some scholars have assumed that Josephus, too, knew 

Berossus only via Polyhistor, the evidence for this is lacking. Other 

scholars have concluded that Josephus had a copy of Berossus’ 

work at hand, and recently Dr. Gregory E. Sterling has strongly 

argued that Josephus quoted directly from Berossus’ work. 7 

Scholars agree that the most reliable of the preserved quotations 

4 Erich Ebeling and Bruno Meissner (eds.), Reallexikon der Assyriologie, Vol. II 

(Berlin and Leipzig: Walter de Gruyter & Co., 1938), pp. 2, 3. 

5 A translation with an extensive discussion of these fragments was published by 

Pau1 Schnabel in Berossos und die Babylonisch-Hellenistische Literatur (Leipzig 

and Berlin: B. G. Teubner, 1923). The first complete English translation of the 

surviving fragments of Berossus’ work has been published by Stanley Mayer 

Burstein in The Babyloniaca of Berossus. Sources from the Ancient Near East, Vol. 

1, fascicle 5 (Malibu, Calif.: Undena Publications, 1978). 

6 See Flavius Josephus, Against Apion, Book L19–21; Antiquities of the Jews, Book 

X:XI, 1. The Chronicle of Eusebius is preserved only in an Armenian version, 

except for the excerpts preserved in the Chronographia of the Byzantine chronicler 

Georgius Syncellus (late eighth and early ninth centuries C.E.). 

7 Gregory E. Sterling, Historiography and Self-Definition (Leiden, New York, Köln: E. 

J. Brill, 1992), pp. 106, 260, 261.


from Berossus’ work are those of Flavius Josephus. 8 

Where did Berossus get his information on the Neo-Babylonian 

kings? 

According to his own words he “translated many books which 

had been preserved with great care at Babylon and which dealt with 

a period of more than 150,000 years.” 9 These “books” included 

accounts of legendary kings “before the Flood” with very 

exaggerated lengths of reign. 

His history of the dynasties after the Flood down to the reign of 

the Babylonian king Nabonassar (747–734 B.C.E.) is also far from 

reliable and evidently contained much legendary material and 

exaggerated lengths of reign. 

Berossus himself indicates that it was impossible to give a 

trustworthy history of Babylonia before Nabonassar, as that king 

“collected and destroyed the records of the kings before him in 

order that the list of Chaldaean kings might begin with him.” 10 

Despite these problems, however, for later periods, and especially 

for the critical Neo-Babylonian period, it has been established that 

Berossus used the generally very reliable Babylonian chronicles, or 

sources similar to these documents, and that he carefully reported 

8 Burstein, for example, says: “The earliest are those made by Josephus in the first 

century A.D. from the sections concerning the second and particularly the third 

book of the Babyloniaca, the latter indeed providing our best evidence for Berossus’ 

treatment of the Neo-Babylonian period.” (Op. cit., pp. 10, 11; emphasis added.) 

Josephus’ lengthy quotation on the Neo-Babylonian era in Against Apion is best 

preserved in Eusebius’ Preparation for the Gospel, Book IX, chapter XL. (See the 

discussion by H. St. J. Thackeray in Josephus, Vol. I [Loeb Classical Library, Vol. 

38:I], London: William Heinemann, and New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1926, pp. 

xviii, xix.) The deficient textual transmission of Eusebius’ Chronicle, therefore, is of 

no consequence for our study. The Watch Tower Society, in its Bible dictionary 

Insight on the Scriptures (Vol. I, p. 453), devotes only one paragraph to Berossus. 

Almost the whole paragraph consists of a quotation from A. T. Olmstead’s Assyrian 

Historiography in which he deplores the tortuous survival history of Berossus’ 

fragments via Eusebius’ Chronicle (cf. note 6 above). Although this is true, it is, as 

noted, essentially irrelevant for our discussion. 

9 Burstein, op. cit.,p. 13. The Armenian version of Eusebius’ Chronicle gives 

“2,150,000 years” instead of “150,000,” the figure preserved by Syncellus. None of 

them is believed to be the original figure given by Berossus. (Burstein, p. 13, note 

3.) 

10 Burstein, op. cit., p. 22.


their contents in Greek. 11 The figures he gives for the reigns of the 

Neo-Babylonian kings substantially agree with the figures given by 

those ancient cuneiform documents. 

A-2: The Royal Canon 

Ptolemy’s Canon or, more correctly, the Royal Canon is a list of kings 

and their lengths of reign beginning with the reign of Nabonassar 

in Babylon (747–734 B.C.E.), through the Babylonian, Persian, 

Greek, Roman, and Byzantine rulers. 

The kinglist had been included in the Handy Tables prepared by 

the famous astronomer and geographer Claudius Ptolemy (70–165 

C.E.), who ended the list with the contemporary Roman ruler 

Antoninus Pius (C.E. 138–161). 12 That is why it has become 

known as Ptolemy’s Canon. (See the facing page.) There is, however, 

evidence that kinglists of this type must have been in use long 

before the time of Claudius Ptolemy. 

The reason why the kinglist could not have originated with 

Claudius Ptolemy is that a table of this kind was a prerequisite for 

the research and calculations performed by the Babylonian and 

Greek astronomers. Without it they would have had no means for 

dating the astronomical events their calculations showed as 

occurring in the distant past. 

Ancient fragments of such kinglists written on papyrus have 

been found. 13 The renowned expert on Babylonian astronomy, F. 

11 Burstein points out that, although Berossus made a number of surprising errors 

and exercised little criticism on his sources, “the fragments make it clear that he 

did choose good sources, most likely from a library at Babylon, and that he reliably 

reported their contents in Greek” (Burstein, op. cit., p. 8. Emphasis added.) Robert 

Drews, in his article “The Babylonian Chronicles and Berossus,” published in Iraq, 

Vol. XXXVII, part 1 (Spring 1975), arrives at the same conclusion: “That the 

chronicles were among these records cannot be doubted.” (p. 54) This has been 

demonstrated by a careful comparison of Berossus’ statements with the 

Babylonian chronicles. Paul Schnabel, too, concludes: “That he everywhere has 

used cuneiform records, above all the chronicles, is manifest at every step.” — 

Schnabel, op. cit. (see note 5 above), p. 184. 

12 The three oldest manuscripts of Ptolemy’s Handy Tables containing the kinglist 

date from the eighth to tenth centuries. See Leo Depuydt, — More Valuable than all 

Gold’: Ptolemy’s Royal Canon and Babylonian Chronology,” in Journal of Cuneiform 

Studies, Vol. 47 (1995), pp. 101–106. The list of kings was continued by 

astronomers after Ptolemy well into the Byzantine period. 

13 G. J. Toomer, Ptolemy’s Almagest (London: Gerald Duckworth & Co., 1984), p. 10, 

ftn. 12. The fragments, however, are later than Ptolemy.


The Royal Canon (“Ptolemy’s Canon”) 

The kinglist begins with the reign of Nabonassar in Babylon (747– 

734 BCE) and ends with the Roman emperor Antoninus Pius 

(138-161 CE). From F. K. Ginzel, Handbuch der matematischen und 

technischen Chronologie, Vol. I :Leipzig 1906), p. 139.


X. Kugler, concluded that the so-called Ptolemy’s Canon “had 

evidently been worked out by one or more experts on the 

Babylonian astronomy and chronology, and through the use in the 

Alexandrian school successfully had passed scrupulous indirect 

tests.” 14 Dr. Eduard Meyer wrote in a similar vein about the canon 

in 1899, pointing out that, “as it belonged to the traditional material 

of knowledge of the astronomers, it was inherited from scholar to 

scholar; not even Hipparchus [2nd century B.C.E.] could have gone 

without the Babylonian list.” 15 

This is the reason why Professor Otto Neugebauer termed the 

expression “Ptolemy’s Canon” a misnomer: 

It is a misnomer to call such chronological tables ‘Ptolemaic 

canon.’ Ptolemy’s ‘Almagest’ never contained such a canon (in spite 

of assertions to the contrary often made in modern literature), but 

we know that a βασιλεων χρουογραφια [chronicle of kings] had 

been included in his ‘Handy Tables’ . . . . On the other hand, there 

is no reason whatsoever to think that royal canons for astronomical 

purposes did not exist long before Ptolemy. 16 

The canon, or kinglist, was therefore in use centuries before 

Claudius Ptolemy. It was inherited and brought up-to-date from 

one generation of scholars to the next. 

It should be observed that the canon not only presents a 

running list of kings and their reigns; in a separate column there is a 

running summary of the individual reigns all the way from the first 

king, Nabonassar, to the end of the list. This system provides a 

double check of the individual figures, ensuring that they have been 

correctly copied from one scholar to the next. (See “The Royal 

Canon” on the preceding page.) 

From what source did the compiler(s) of the Royal Canon get 

the kinglist? It was evidently compiled from sources similar to 

those used by Berossus. Friedrich Schmidtke explains: 

14 Franz Xaver Kugler, Sternkunde and Sterndienst in Babel, II. Buch, II. Teil, Heft 2 

(Munster in Westfalen: Aschendorffsche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1924), p. 390. 

Translated from the German. 

15 Eduard Meyer, Forschungen zur alten Geschichte, Zweiter Band (Halle a. S.: Max 

Niemeyer, 1899), pp. 453–454. Translated from the German. Emphasis added. 

16 Otto Neugebauer, “`Years’ in Royal Canons,” A Locust’s Leg. Studies in honour of S. 

H. Taqizadeh, ed. W. B. Henning and E. Yarshater (London: Percy Lund, 

Humphries & Co., 1962), pp. 209, 210. Compare also J. A. Brinkman in A Political 

History of Post-Kassite Babylonia, 1158–722 B.C. (Rome: Pontificium Institutum 

Biblicum, 1968),p. 22.


With respect to the dependence of the sources, the Canon of 

Ptol[emy] has certainly to a great extent taken its stuff from the 

Bab[ylonian] Chron[icles]. This is clear from the characteristic 

aβαοτλεντα ετη [years of interregnum] 688–681, which is also found 

in the Chronicle (III, 28), while the King List A at this place 

introduces Sennacherib instead, as well as for the two aβαοτλεντα 

ετη 704–703. The Canon of Ptol. like the Chronicle reproduces 

here the Babylonian tradition, which did not recognize 

Sennacherib as the legitimate king, as he had sacked and destroyed 

Babylon. 17 

There is also some evidence that the Royal Canon reflects not 

only Babylonian chronicles, but also ancient Babylonian kinglists 

compiled by Babylonian scribes. Thus scholars have concluded that 

it was based upon Babylonian chronicles and kinglists, probably 

through intermediary sources, but evidently independent of Berossus. 18 

This is a very important conclusion, as the figures given in the 

canon for the Neo-Babylonian kings are in substantial agreement 

with Berossus’ earlier figures. 

Thus we have two independent witnesses reflecting the length 

of the Neo-Babylonian era set out in the ancient chronicles, and 

even if those chronicles are only partially preserved on cuneiform 

tablets, their figures for the lengths of reign of the Neo-Babylonian 

kings have to all appearances been correctly transmitted to us via 

Berossus and the Royal Canon. 19 

17 Friedrich Schmidtke, Der Aufbau der Babylonischen Chronologie (Munster, Westf.: 

Aschendorffsche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1952), p.41. Translated from the German. 

18 Burstein, for example, points out that the canon “represents a Babylonian 

tradition about the first millennium B.C. that is independent of Berossus as can be 

seen from the order and forms of the names of the kings.” (Op. cit., p.38) On the 

same page Burstein gives a translation of the canon which, unfortunately, 

contains a couple of errors. The regnal years shown for Nebuchadnezzar, “ 23”, is a 

misprint for “43”; and the name “Illoaroudamos” in the canon corresponds to 

“Awel-Marduk”, not “Labasi-Marduk”. For a reliable publication of the canon, see, 

for example, E. J. Bickerman, Chronology of the Ancient World, revised edition 

(London: Thames and Hudson, 1980), pp. 109–111. 

19 Of the two sources, the Royal Canon is clearly the better witness. As Professor J. A. 

Brinkman points out, the canon “is of known and praiseworthy accuracy.” (Op. cit. 

[note 16 above], p. 35) Modern discoveries of Babylonian chronicles, kinglists, 

astronomical texts, etc., written in cuneiform may be shown to be in complete 

agreement with the canon all the way from the eighth century to the first century 

B.C.E. The evidence of this is briefly discussed in C. O. Jonsson, “The Foundations 

of the Assyro-Babylonian Chronology,” Chronology & Catastrophism Review, Vol. IX 

(Harpenden, England: Society for Interdisciplinary Studies, 1987), pp. 14–23.


TABLE 1: THE REIGNS OF THE NEO-BABYLONIAN KINGS 

ACCORDING TO BEROSSUS AND THE ROYAL CANON 

NAME BEROSSUS ROYAL CANON B.C.E. 

Nabopolassar 21 years 21 years 625–605 

Nebuchadnezzar 

Awel-Marduk* 

43 years 

2 years 

43 years 

2 years 

604–562 

561–560 

Neriglissar 4 years 4 years 559–556 

Labashi-Marduk 

Nabonidus 

9 months 

17 years 

— 

17 years 

556 

555–539 

*Called Evil-Merodach at 2 Kings 25:27 and Jeremiah 52:31. 

The Royal Canon omits Labashi-Marduk, as it always reckons 

whole years only. Labashi-Marduk’s short reign of only a few 

months fell in Neriglissar’s last year (which was also the accessionyear 

of Nabonidus). 20 The Royal Canon, therefore, could leave him 

out. 

If these lists are correct, the first year of Nebuchadnezzar would 

be 604/ 603 B.C.E. and his eighteenth year, when he desolated 

Jerusalem, would be 587/86 B.C.E., not 607 B.C.E. as in Watch 

Tower chronology. 

But even if these lists give a true representation of the lengths of 

reign given in the original Neo-Babylonian chronicles, how do we 

know that the chronological information originally contained in 

these chronicles is reliable? How can the lengths of reign of the 

kings be turned into an “absolute chronology” ?21 

20 As shown by contemporary cuneiform documents, Neriglissar died in the first 

month of his fourth regnal year (in late April or early May). His son and successor, 

Labashi-Marduk, was killed in a rebellion after a reign of about two months. The 

figure given by Berossus via Josephus, “9” months, is commonly regarded as a 

transmission error for an original “2” months, the Greek signs (=letters) for “9” (θ) 

and “2” (β) being quite similar. (R. A. Parker and W. H. Dubberstein, Babylonian 

Chronology 626 B.C.–A.D. 75, Providence: Brown University Press, 1956, p. 13.) 

The Uruk King List (discussed below) indicates a rule of three months for Labashi- 

Marduk, which undoubtedly refers to the city of Uruk, where he was recognized as 

king for parts of three months (Nisanu, Ayyaru, and Simanu) according to the 

contract tablets.—Paul-Alain Beaulieu, The Reign of Nabonidus, King of Babylon, 

556–539 B.C. (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1989), pp. 86–90. 

21 As pointed out in the previous chapter, an absolute chronology is best established 

by the aid of astronomically fixed dates. Claudius Ptolemy, in his famous work 

Almagest, records a large number of ancient astronomical observations, many of 

which are detailed descriptions of lunar eclipses. One of these is dated to the fifth 

year of Nabopolassar and has been identified with one that took place in 621 

B.C.E. If this was the fifth year of Nabopolassar, his 21 years of reign would be 

fixed to 625–605 B.C.E. The first year


B. THE CUNEIFORM DOCUMENTS* 

Today, historians do not need either Berossus or the Royal Canon 

in order to fix the length of the Neo-Babylonian period. Its length 

may be firmly established in many other ways, thanks to the 

numerous cuneiform documents discovered from this period. 

It is a remarkable fact that more cuneiform documents have 

been excavated from the Neo-Babylonian period than from any 

other pre-Christian era. Literally tens of thousands of texts have been 

found, primarily consisting of business, administrative, and legal 

documents, but there are also historical documents such as 

chronicles and royal inscriptions. 

Most important are the discovery of astronomical cuneiform texts 

recording dated observations of the moon and the planets from the 

period. Most of this material is written in the Akkadian language 

and has been unearthed in Mesopotamia since the middle of the 

nineteenth century. 

The first group of documents of interest to us fall within the 

category shown on the following page, with others on subsequent 

pages. 

of his son and successor, Nebuchadnezzar, would then have begun in 604 B .C.E. 

and his 18th year (when he desolated Jerusalem) in 587. Some scholars, however, 

have questioned the reliability of the astronomical observations recorded by 

Ptolemy. In his sensational book, The Crime of Claudius Ptolemy (Baltimore and 

London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1977), Dr. Robert R. Newton claimed 

that Ptolemy fudged, not only a large body of the observations he says he made 

himself, but also a number of the observations he records from earlier periods. 

(The evidence is, though, that all observations from earlier periods recorded by 

Ptolemy were taken over from the Greek mathematician Hipparchus [second 

century B.C.E.], who in turn got them directly from Babylonian astronomers. See 

G. J. Toomer’s article, “Hipparchus and Babylonian Astronomy,” in A Scientific 

Humanist. Studies in Memory of Abraham Sachs, eds. E. Leichty, M. del . . Ellis, & P. 

Gerardi, Philadelphia, 1988, pp. 353–362.) On the assumption that Ptolemy was 

the originator of “Ptolemy’s Canon,” Newton also felt that Ptolemy’s supposed 

forgery may have extended to inventing the lengths of reign in this kinglist. But as 

the kinglist was not a creation of Ptolemy, Newton was mistaken in this. In earlier 

editions of the present work Newton’s claims and the ensuing debate they have 

caused in scholarly journals were discussed at some length. This digression from 

the main subject has been left out in this edition not only for reasons of space, but 

also because the observations recorded by Ptolemy really are of little importance 

for our discussion. It should be noted, however, that “very few historians of 

astronomy have accepted Newton’s conclusions in their entirety.”— Dr. James 

Evans in the Journal for the History of Astronomy, Vol. 24 Parts 1/2,1993, pp. 145, 

146. (Dr. Newton died in 1991.) An article on R. R. Newton and the Royal Canon is 

published on the web: http://user.tninet.se/~oof408u/fkf/english/newtpol.htm 

For the readers convenience, this article has been added to the material at the end 

of the present book. 

* “Cuneiform” refers to the “wedge-shaped” script used on these ancient clay 

tablets. The signs were impressed on the damp clay with a pointed stick or reed 

(stylus).


B-1: Chronicles, kinglists, and royal inscriptions 

a) Neo-Babylonian Chronicles 

A chronicle is a form of historical narrative covering a sequence of 

events. 

Several cuneiform chronicles covering parts of Neo-Babylonian 

history have been discovered, all of which are kept in the British 

Museum, London. Most of them are probably copies of (or 

extracts from) original documents written contemporary with the 

events. 22 

The most recent translation of them has been published by A. 

K. Grayson in Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles. 23 Grayson 

subdivides the Babylonian chronicles into two parts, the first of 

which is called the Neo-Babylonian Chronicle Series (Chronicles 1– 

7). Chronicle 1 (= B.M. 92502) begins with the reign of Nabonassar 

(747–734 B.C.E.) and ends with the accession-year of Shamashshuma-ukin 

(668 B.C.E.). Chronicles 2–7 begin with the accessionyear 

of Nabopolassar (626 B.C.E.) and continue into the beginning 

of the reign of Cyrus (538 B.C.E.). 

What do these “chronicles” consist of? With respect to the 

contents of the chronicles, Grayson explains: 

The narrative is divided into paragraphs with each paragraph 

normally devoted to one regnal year. The text is concerned only 

with matters related to Babylonia and, in particular, her king, and 

the events, which are almost exclusively political and military in 

character, are narrated in an objective and laconically dry 

manner. 24 

22 Professor D. J. Wiseman says: “The Neo-Babylonian Chronicle texts are written in a 

small script of a type which does not of itself allow any precise dating but which 

can mean that they were written from any time almost contemporary with the 

events themselves to the end of the Achaemenid rule [331 B.C.E.].” (Chronicles of 

Chaldean Kings [London: The Trustees of the British Museum, 1961], p. 4) 

Professor J. A. Brinkman is a little more specific, stating that the extant copies of 

the Neo-Babylonian chronicles are “slightly antedating the Historiai of Herodotus,” 

which was written c. 430 B.C.E. (J. A. Brinkman, “The Babylonian Chronicle 

Revisited,” in Lingering Over Words. Studies in Ancient Near Eastern Literature in 

Honor of William L. Moran, ed. T. Abusch, J. Huehnergard, and P. Steinkeller 

[Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1990], pp. 73, 85.) Dr. E. N. Voigtlander says that the 

copies of the Neo-Babylonian chronicles seem to come from the reign of Darius I 

(Voigtlander, A Survey of Neo-Babylonian History [unpublished doctoral thesis, 

University of Michigan, 1963], p. 204, note 45.) Chronicle 1A has a colophon* in 

which it is explicitly stated that the text was copied (from an earlier original) in the 

22nd year of Darius I (500/499 B.C.E.). 

23 A. K. Grayson, Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles (Locust Valley, New York: J.J. 

Augustin Publisher, 1975). The work will hereafter be referred to as ABC. 

24 A. K. Grayson in Reallexikon der Assyriologie and vorderasiatischen Archäologie 

(henceforth abbreviated RLA), ed. D. O. Edzard, Vol. VI (Berlin and New York: 

Walter de Gruyter, 1980), p. 86. 

* The term colophon derives from a tablet inscription appended by a scribe to the end of an 

ancient Near East (e.g., Early/Middle/Late Babylonian, Assyrian, Canaanite) text such as 

a chapter, book, manuscript, or record. In the ancient Near East, scribes typically


The Babylonian Chronicle BM 21946 

This chronicle covers the period from Nabopolassar’s 21st year (605/04 

B.C.E.) to Nebuchadnezzar’s 10th year (595/94 B.C.E.). Photo used 

courtesy of D. J. Wiseman (shown in his Nebuchadrezzar and Babylon, Plate 

VI). 

recorded information on clay tablets. The colophon usually contained facts relative to 

the text such as associated person(s) (e.g., the scribe, owner, or commissioner of the 

tablet), literary contents (e.g., a title, "catch" phrase, number of lines), and occasion or 

purpose of writing. Colophons and "catch phrases" (repeated phrases) helped the reader 

organize and identify various tablets, and keep related tablets together.


Most of these chronicles are incomplete. The extant (actually 

existing) parts of Chronicles 2-7 cover the following regnal years: 

TABLE 2: EXTANT PARTS OF THE NEO-BABYLONIAN CHRONICLES 2–7 

CHRONICLE NO. RULER REGNAL YEARS 

COVERED 

No.2 = B.M. 25127 Nabopolassar acc.-year – 3 

3 = B.M. 21901 Nabopolassar 10 – 17 

4 = B.M. 22047 Nabopolassar 18 – 20 

5 = B.M. 21946 Nabopolassar 21 

” ” ” Nebuchadnezzar acc.-year – 10 

6 = B.M. 25124 Neriglissar 3 

7 = B.M. 35382 Nabonidus 1 – 11 

” ” ” Nabonidus 17 

In all, the Neo-Babylonian period (625–539 B.C.E.) includes a 

total of eighty-seven regnal years. As is seen in the preceding table, 

less than half of these years are covered by the preserved parts of 

the chronicles. Yet some important information may be gathered 

from them. 

Chronicle 5 (B.M. 21946) shows that Nabopolassar ruled Babylon 

for twenty-one years, and that he was succeeded by his son 

Nebuchadnezzar. That part of the text says: 

For twenty-one years Nabopolassar ruled Babylon. On the 

eighth day of the month Ab he died. In the month of Elul 

Nebuchadnezzar (II) returned to Babylon and on the first day 

of the month he ascended the royal throne in Babylon. 25 

The last chronicle (B .M. 35382), the famous Nabonidus Chronicle, 

covers the reign of Nabonidus, who was the father of Belshazzar. 

This chronicle unfortunately is damaged. The portion covering 

Nabonidus’ twelfth year to his sixteenth year of rule is lacking, and 

the portion where the words for “seventeenth year” no doubt 

originally could be read, is damaged. 26 

Notably, however, for the sixth year it is stated that Cyrus, king 

of Anshan, defeated the Median king Astyages and captured 

Ecbatana, the capital of Media. 27 If Nabonidus ruled for seventeen 

25 Grayson, ABC (1975), pp. 99, 100. 

26 Ibid. p. 109. 

27 Ibid., pp. 106, 107. “The sixth year,” too, is missing, but as the record for each year 

is separated from the next year by a horizontal line, and as the account of 

Astyages’ defeat immediately preceeds the record for the seventh year, it is quite 

evident that it refers to the sixth year. – Anshan was a city and also an archaic 

name of the province in which it was situated, Parsa (Persis), which lay at the 

Persian Gulf southeast of Babylonia. At the time of Cyrus’ rise to power, Anshan 

(Parsa) was a Median tributary kingdom.


years and if he was dethroned by Cyrus in 539 B.C.E., his first year 

must have been 555/54 B .C.E. and his sixth year, when Cyrus 

conquered Media, must have been 550/49 B.C.E. 

The Watch Tower Society, in fact, agrees with these datings. The 

reason is that the secular basis of its chronology, 539 B.C.E. as the 

date for the fall of Babylon, is directly connected with the reign of 

Cyrus. The Greek historian Herodotus, in the fifth century B.C.E., 

says that Cyrus’ total rule was twenty-nine years. 28 As Cyrus died in 

530 B.C.E., in the ninth year of his rule over Babylonia, his first 

year as king of Anshan must have begun in c. 559 B.C.E., or about 

three years before Nabonidus acceded to the throne of Babylon. 

Suppose now that twenty years have to be added to the Neo- 

Babylonian era, which is required if the destruction of Jerusalem is 

28 Herodotus’ Historiai I:210–216. Other ancient historians such as Ktesias, Dinon, 

Diodorus, Africanus, and Eusebius roughly agree with this length of reign for 

Cyrus. — See Insight on the Scriptures (1988), Vol. 1, p. 454.


set at 607 rather than 587 B.C.E., and that we add these twenty 

years to the reign of Nabonidus, making it thirty-seven years 

instead of seventeen. Then his first year must have been 575/74 

B.C.E. instead of 555/54. Nabonidus’ sixth year, when Astyages 

was defeated by Cyrus, would then be moved back from 550/49 to 

570/69 B.C.E. 

Those dates, however, are impossible, as Cyrus did not come to 

power until c. 559 B.C.E., as was shown above. He clearly could 

not have defeated Astyages ten years before he came to power! 

This is why the Society correctly dates this battle in 550 B.C.E., 

thereby indicating Nabonidus’ reign of seventeen years to be 

correct, as is held by all authorities and classical authors. 29 

Though the chronicles available do not furnish a complete 

chronology for the Neo-Babylonian period, the information which 

they do preserve supports the dates for the lengths of the reigns of 

the Neo-Babylonian kings given by Berossus and the Royal Canon. 

As the earlier-presented evidence strongly indicates that both of 

these sources derived their information from the Babylonian 

chronicles independent of each other, and as their figures for the 

Neo-Babylonian reigns agree, it is logical to conclude that the 

chronological information originally given in the Neo-Babylonian 

chronicles has been preserved unaltered by Berossus and the Royal 

Canon. 

Even if this is agreed upon, however, can the information given 

by these Babylonian chronicles be trusted? 

It is often pointed out that the Assyrian scribes distorted history 

in order to glorify their kings and gods. “It is a well known fact that 

in Assyrian royal inscriptions a serious military set-back is never 

openly admitted.” 30 Sometimes scribes garbled the narration by 

29 1nsight on the Scriptures (1988), Vol. 1, pp. 454, 566; Vol. 2, p. 612. That Astyages 

was defeated in 550 B.C.E. may also be argued on other grounds. If, as stated by 

Herodotus (Historiai I:130), Astyages ruled Media for thirty-five years, his reign 

would have begun in 585 B.C.E. (550+35=585). He was the successor of his father 

Cyaxares, who had died shortly after a battle with Alyattes of Lydia, which 

according to Herodotus (Historiai I:73, 74) was interrupted by a solar eclipse. 

Actually, a total solar eclipse visible in that area took place on May 28, 585 

B.C.E., which is commonly identified with the one mentioned by Herodotus.—I. M. 

Diakonoff, The Cambridge History of Iran, Vol. 2 (Cambridge: Cambridge 

University Press, 1985), pp. 112, 126; cf. M. Miller, “The earlier Persian dates in 

Herodotus,” Klio, Vol. 37 (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1959), p. 48. 

30 A. K. Grayson, “Assyria and Babylonia,” Orientalia, Vol.49, Fasc. 2,1980, p. 171. 

See also Antti Laato in Vetus Testamentum, Vol. XLV:2, April 1995, pp. 198–226.


changing the date of a defeat and weaving it into an account of a 

later battle. 31 Do the Neo-Babylonian chronicles treat history in 

this way, too? 

Dr. A. K. Grayson, a well-known authority on the Assyrian 

and Babylonian chronicles, concludes: 

Unlike the Assyrian scribes the Babylonians neither fail to 

mention Babylonian defeats nor do they attempt to change them 

into victories. The chronicles contain a reasonably reliable and 

representative record of important events in the period with which 

they are concerned. 32 

We have reason for assurance, then, that the figures for the 

reigns of the Neo-Babylonian kings given by these chronicles and 

preserved to our time—thanks to Berossus and the Royal Canon— 

represent the actual reigns of these kings. This conclusion will be 

confirmed, over and over again, in the further discussion. 

b) Babylonian king lists 

A cuneiform king list differs from a chronicle in that it is usually a 

list of royal names with the addition of regnal years, similar to the 

later Royal Canon. 

Although a number of king lists both from Assyria and Babylonia 

have been unearthed, only one of them covers the Neo-Babylonian 

era: the Uruk King List, shown on the following page. 

Unfortunately, as can be seen, it is badly preserved, and some 

portions of it are missing. Nonetheless, as will be demonstrated, it 

has definite historical value. 

The preserved portions cover the periods from Kandalanu to 

Darius I (647–486 B.C.E.) and, on the reverse side, from Darius III 

to Seleucus II (335-226 B.C.E.). It was evidently composed from 

older sources sometime after the reign of Seleucus II. 

31 Grayson, ibid.(1980),p. 171. 

32 Ibid., p. 175. This does not mean that the chronicles are infallible records. As Dr. J. 

A. Brinkman points out, “lack of nationalistic prejudice does not insure factual 

reliability; and the Babylonian chronicles have their share of proven errors.” Still, 

he agrees that the chronicles contain an essentially reliable record of events and 

dates for the period between the eighth and sixth centuries B.C.E.: “For the period 

from 745 to 668, these documents list rulers and exact dates of reign in Babylonia, 

Assyria, and Elam. Coverage thereafter is spotty, in part because of lacunae in the 

record; but these texts still furnish most of the precise chronological background 

for present knowledge of the downfall of the Late Assyrian Empire, the rise of the 

Neo-Babylonian Empire, the reign of Nabonidus, and the transition to Persian 

rule.”—Brinkman in Lingering Over Words (see note 22 above), pp. 74 and 100, 

note 148. For additional comments on the reliability of the Neo-Babylonian 

chronicles, see Chapter 7: “Attempts to overcome the evidence.”


The Uruk King List (W 20030, 105) 

As reproduced by J. van Dijk in UVB 18 (Berlin 1962), tablet 28a. The 

transcription to the right is that of A. K. Grayson in RLA VI (1980), 

page 97. 

The Uruk King List was discovered during the excavations at 

Uruk (modern Warka in southern Iraq) in 1959–60 together with 

about 1,000 other cuneiform texts (mostly economic texts) from 

different periods. 33 

The preserved portion of the obverse (front or principal side), 

which includes the Neo-Babylonian period, gives the following 

chronological information (damaged or missing portions are 

indicated by quotation marks or parentheses): 34 

33 The first transcription and translation of the text, which included an extensive 

discussion by Dr. J. van Dijk, was published in 1962.—J. van Dijk, UVB (= 

Vorläufiger Bericht über die von dem Deutschen Archäologischen Institut unter der 

Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft aus Mitteln der Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft 

unternommenen Ausgrabungen in Uruk-Warka), Vol. 18, Berlin, 1962, pp. 53–60. 

An English version of van Dijk’s translation (of the kinglist) is published by J. B. 

Pritchard, The Ancient Near East (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University 

Press, 1969), p. 566. Another, more recent transcription by A. K. Grayson was 

published in 1980.—A. K. Grayson, RLA (see note 24 and the picture above), Vol. 

VI (1980), pp. 97, 98. 

34 Based upon Grayson’s transcription in RLA VI (1980), p. 97.


THE URUK KING LIST 

(obverse) 

21 years K(anda)lanu 

1 year Sin-shum-lishir and 

Sin-shar-ishkun 

21 years Nabopolassar 

43 (ye)ars Nebuchadnezzar 

2 (ye)ars Awel-Marduk 

‘3’ (years) 8 months Neriglissar 

(. . .) 3 months Labashi-Marduk 

‘17[?]’ (years) Nabonidus 

As is seen, the royal names and the preserved figures for the 

Neo-Babylonian period agree with those of Berossus and the Royal 

Canon: Nabopolassar is given 21 years, Nebuchadnezzar 43 years, 

and Awel-Marduk (Evil-merodach) 2 years. The only deviation is 

the length of Labashi-Marduk’s reign, which is given as 3 months 

against Berossus’ 9 months. The smaller figure is without doubt 

correct, as is proved by the economic documents unearthed. 35 

In contrast to the Royal Canon, which always gives whole years 

only, the Uruk King List is more specific in also giving months for 

the reigns of Neriglissar and Labashi-Marduk. The damaged figures 

for Neriglissar and Nabonidus may be restored (reconstructed) as 

“3 years, 8 months,” and “17 years,” respectively. The economic 

texts also indicate Neriglissar’s reign to have been three years and 

eight months (August 560–April 556 B.C.E.). 36 

Thus, once again, we find the figures of Berossus and the Royal 

Canon confirmed by this ancient document, the Uruk King List. 

Admittedly, this king list was composed (from older documents) 

more than 300 years after the end of the Neo-Babylonian era. On 

this basis it might be argued that scribal errors may have crept into 

it. 

35 See note 20 above. At any rate, Labashi-Marduk’s reign was swallowed up by 

Neriglissar’s fourth year, which was also Nabonidus’ accession-year, and the total 

length of the era is not affected. 

36 J. van Dijk, UVB 18 (see note 33 above), page 57. As Neriglissar died in his fourth 

regnal year, his reign would normally have been counted chronologically as four 

years, according to the Babylonian accession-year system. The Uruk King List 

deviates from this method at this point by giving more specific information. As van 

Dijk points out, “the list is more precise than the [Royal] Canon and confirms 

throughout the results of the research.”—Archiv fair Orientforschung, ed. E. 

Weidner, Vol. 20 (Graz, 1963), p. 217. For further information on the month of 

Neriglissar’s accession and the Uruk King List, see the Appendix for Chapter 3.


So it is important to ask: Are there then no historical records 

preserved from the Neo-Babylonian era itself which establish its 

chronology? Yes, there are, as is immediately evident. 

c) Royal inscriptions 

Royal inscriptions of different kinds (building inscriptions, votive 

inscriptions, annals, etc.) from the Assyrian and Babylonian eras 

themselves have been found in great numbers. 

In 1912 a German translation of the then-known Neo- 

Babylonian inscriptions was published by Stephen Langdon, but 

since then many new ones from the period in question have been 

unearthed. 37 A new translation of all the Neo-Babylonian royal 

inscriptions is therefore being prepared. 38 

This is an enormous task. Paul-Richard Berger estimates that 

about 1,300 royal inscriptions, one third of which are undamaged, 

have been found from the Neo-Babylonian period, most of them 

from the reigns of Nabopolassar and Nebuchadnezzar. 39 

For the chronology that we are concerned with, three of the 

inscriptions are especially valuable. All of them are original 

documents from the reign of Nabonidus. 40 How do they aid in 

establishing the critical date for Jerusalem’s destruction? 

We have seen that in advocating a 607 B.C.E. date, the Watch 

Tower Society questions the reliability of the duration of the Neo- 

Babylonian period as presented by both Berossus and the Royal 

Canon (often called Ptolemy’s Canon), finding the total 20 years 

too short. The first of the royal inscriptions to be discussed, called 

37 Stephen Langdon, Die neubabylonischen Königsinschriften (=Vorderasiatische 

Bibliothek, Vol. IV) (Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs’sche Buchhandlung, 1912). 

38 The first of the three planned volumes was published in 1973 as Paul-Richard 

Berger, Die neubabylonischen Königsinschriften (=Alter Orient und Altes Testament, 

Vol. 4/1) (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1973). 

39 About 75 percent of these documents were found in Babylon during the detailed 

excavations of R. Koldewey in 1899–1917. (Berger, ibid., pp. 1–3) As explained by 

Dr. Ronald Sack, “a virtual mountain” of royal inscriptions have survived from the 

reign of Nebuchadnezzar alone. (Images of Nebuchadnezzar [Selinsgrove: 

Susquehanna University Press; London and Toronto: Associated University Press, 

1991],p. 26.) Six of the inscriptions are from the reign of Awel-Marduk, eight from 

the reign of Neriglissar, and about thirty from the reign of Nabonidus. (Berger, op. 

cit., pp. 325388.) 

40 In 1989 Paul-Alain Beaulieu, in his doctoral thesis The Reign of Nabonidus, 

included a new catalogue with detailed descriptions of the royal inscriptions from 

the reign of Nabonidus. —Paul-Alain Beaulieu, The Reign of Nabonidus, King of 

Babylon 556–539 B.C. (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1989), pp. 

1–42.


Nabonidus No. 18, confirms the length of reign for that king as 

found in those ancient sources. 

The second cuneiform tablet, Nabonidus No. 8, clearly 

establishes the total length of the reigns of the Neo-Babylonian kings 

up to Nabonidus, and enables us to know both the beginning year 

of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign and the crucial year in which he 

desolated Jerusalem. 

The third, Nabonidus No. 24, provides the length of the reign 

of each Neo-Babylonian king from the first ruler, Nabopolassar, 

onward and down to the ninth year of the last ruler, Nabonidus 

(Belshazzar was evidently a coregent with his father Nabonidus at 

the time of Babylon’s fall). 41 

Following are the details for each of these cuneiform tablets: 

(1) Nabon. No.18 is a cylinder inscription from an unnamed year 

of Nabonidus. Fulfilling the desire of Sin, the moon-god, 

Nabonidus dedicated a daughter of his (named En-nigaldi-Nanna) 

to this god as priestess at the Sin temple of Ur. 

The important fact here is that an eclipse of the moon, dated in the 

text to Ulûlu 13 and observed in the morning watch, led to this 

dedication. Ulûlu, the sixth month in the Babylonian calendar, 

corresponded to parts of August and September (or, sometimes, 

parts of September and October) in our calendar. The inscription 

explicitly states that the moon “set while eclipsed,” that is, the 

eclipse began before and ended after sunrise. 42 Its end, therefore, 

was invisible at Babylon. 

41 Unfortunately, scholars have arranged or numbered the inscriptions differently, 

which may cause some confusion. In the systems of Tadmor, Berger, and Beaulieu 

the three inscriptions are listed as follows: 

Tadmor 1965: Berger 1973: Beaulieu 1989: 

(1) Nabon. No. 18 Nbd Zyl. II, 7 No. 2 

(2) Nabon. No. 8 Nbd Stl. Frgm. XI No. 1 

(3) Nabon. No. 24 (missing) (Adad-guppi stele) 

Beaulieu’s arrangement is chronological: No. 1 was written in Nabonidus’ first 

year, No. 2 in his second year, and No. 13 after year 13, possibly in year 14 or 15. 

(Beaulieu, op. cit., p.42.) In Tadmor’ s list Nabonidus’ inscriptions are numbered in 

the order of their publication, starting with the fifteen texts published by Langdon 

in 1912. (Hayim Tadmor, “The Inscriptions of Nabunaid: Historical Arrangement,” 

in Studies in Honor of Benno Landsberger on his Seventy-Fifth Birthday [= 

Assyriological Studies, No. 16], ed. H. Güterbock & T. Jacobsen, Chicago, The 

Chicago University Press, 1965, pp. 351–363.) The systems of Tadmor, Berger, and 

Beaulieu, in turn, differ from that of H. Lewy in Archiv Orientální, Vol. XVII, Prague, 

1949, pp. 34, 35, note 32. In the discussion here presented Tadmor’s numbers will 

be used. 

42 This part of the text says, according to Beaulieu’s translation: “On account of the 

wish for an entu priestess, in the month Ulûlu, the month (whose Sumerian name 

means) ‘work of the goddesses,’ on the thirteenth day the moon was eclipsed and 

set while eclipsed. Sin requested an entu priestess. Thus (were) his sign and his


Of what significance is all this? 

When sufficient details about a lunar eclipse are available and it 

is known that the eclipse occurred within a certain limited time 

period in the past, astronomical movements are so precise that the 

date of a specific eclipse in a particular area can be determined 

accurately. Since the details here meet the requirement, when 

during Nabonidus’ reign did the eclipse described on the ancient 

tablet take place? 

In 1949 Hildegard Lewy examined the eclipse and found that 

only once during Nabonidus’ reign did such an eclipse take place at 

this time of the year, that is, on September 26, 554 B.C.E. (Julian 

calendar). 43 The eclipse began about 3:00 am. and lasted for about 

three hours. If Nabonidus ruled for seventeen years and his first 

year was 555/54 B.C.E., as is generally held, the eclipse and the 

dedication of Nabonidus’ daughter took place in his second regnal 

year (554/53 B.C.E.). 

A remarkable confirmation of this dating was brought to light 

twenty years later, when W. G. Lambert published his translation 

of four fragments of an inscription from Nabonidus’s reign which 

he named the Royal Chronicle. The inscription establishes that the 

dedication of Nabonidus’ daughter took place shortly before his 

third year, and obviously in his second, precisely as Lewy had 

concluded. 44 

The lunar eclipse of Ulûlu 13, then, definitely fixes the second 

year of Nabonidus to 554/53 B.C.E. and his first year to 555/54, 

decision.” (Beaulieu, op. cit., p. 127) The conclusion that this lunar eclipse 

indicated that Sin requested a priestess was evidently based on the astrological 

tablet series Enurna Anu Enlil, the “Holy Writ” of the Assyrian and Babylonian 

astrologers, who regularly based their interpretations of astronomical events on 

this old omina collection. A lunar eclipse seen in the morning-watch of Ulûlu 13 is 

expressly interpreted in these tablets as an indication that Sin desires a 

priestess.—See H. Lewy, “The Babylonian Background of the Kay Kaus Legend,” 

Archiv Orientální Vol. XVII (ed. by B. Hrozny, Prague, 1949), pp. 50, 51. 

43 H. Lewy, op. cit., pp. 50, 51. 

44 W. G. Lambert, “A New Source for the Reign of Nabonidus, “Archiv für 

Orientforschung, Vol. 22 (ed. by Ernst Weidner, Graz, 1968/69), pp. 1–8. Lewy’s 

conclusion has been confirmed by other scholars. (See for example Beaulieu, 

op.cit., pp. 127–128.) The eclipse of September 26, 554 BCE, was examined in 

1999 by Professor F. Richard Stephenson at Durham, England, who is a leading 

expert on ancient eclipses. He says: 

”My computed details are as follows (times to the nearest tenth of an hour): 

(i) Beginning at3.0 h[our] local time, lunar altitude 34deg[rees] in the SW. 

(ii) End at 6.1 h[our] local time, lunar altitude -3 deg[rees] in the W. 

The eclipse would thus end about 15 minutes after moonset. A deep 

penumbral eclipse may possibly be visible for a very few minutes and 

them is always the possibility of anomalous refraction at the horizon. 

However, I would judge that the Moon indeed set eclipsed on this 

occasion.”—Letter Stephenson-Jonsson, dated March 5, 1999.


thus giving a very strong confirmation to the figures for 

Nabonidus’ reign set forth by Berossus and the Royal Canon. 45 

(2) Nabon. No. 8, or the Hillah stele, was discovered at the end of 

the 19th century in the neighborhood of Hillah, about four miles 

southeast of the ruins of Babylon. 46 

The inscription “consists of a report on the accession year and 

the beginning of the first regnal year of Nabonidus” and may be 

shown, on the basis of internal evidence, to have been written 

toward the middle of his first regnal year (in the autumn of 555 

B.C.E.) 47 

The information given on this stele alone helps us to establish the 

total length of the period from Nabopolassar to the beginning of the reign of 

Nabonidus. How does it do this? 

In several of his royal inscriptions (No. 1, 8, 24, and 25 in 

Tadmor’s list) Nabonidus says that in a dream in his accession year, 

he was commanded by the gods Marduk and Sin to rebuild Éhulhul, 

the temple of the moon god Sin in Harran. In connection with this, 

the text under discussion (Nabon. No. 8) provides a very 

interesting piece of information: 

(Concerning) Harran (and) the Éhulhul, which had been lying 

in ruins for 54 years because of its devastation by the Medes (who) 

destroyed the sanctuaries, with the consent of the gods the time 

for reconciliation approached, 54 years, when Sin should return to 

his place. When he returned to his place, Sin, the lord of the tiara, 

remembered his lofty seat, and (as to) all the gods who left his 

chapel with him, it is Marduk, the king of the gods, who ordered 

their gathering. 48 

45 Someone might claim it is possible to find another lunar eclipse setting heliacally 

on UMW 13 a number of years earlier that fits the description given by Nabonidus, 

perhaps about twenty years earlier, in order to adapt the observation to the 

chronology of the Watch Tower Society. However, modern astronomical 

calculations show that no such lunar eclipse, visible in Babylonia, took place at 

this time of the year within twenty years, or even within fifty years before the reign 

of Nabonidus! The closest lunar eclipse of this kind occurred fifty-four years 

earlier, on August 24, 608 B.C.E. The lunar eclipse of Nabon. No. 18, therefore, 

can only be that of September 26, 554 B.C.E. For additional information on the 

identification of ancient lunar eclipses, see the Appendix for Chapter 4: “Some 

comments on ancient lunar eclipses “ 

46 A translation of the text was published by S. Langdon in 1912, op. cit. (note 37 

above), pp.53–57, 270–289. For an English translation, see Ancient Near Eastern 

Texts (hereafter referred to as ANET), ed. James B. Pritchard (Princeton, N. J.: 

Princeton University Press, 1950), pp. 308–311. 

47 Col. IX mentions Nabonidus’ visit to southern Babylonia soon after a New Years’ 

festival. This visit is also documented in archival texts from Larsa dated to the first 

two months of Nabonidus’ first year. — Beaulieu, op. cit., pp. 21, 22, 117–127. 

48 Translated by Beaulieu, op. cit., p. 107.


The date when the temple Éhulhul in Harran was ruined by the 

Medes is known to us from two different reliable sources: 

The Babylonian Chronicle 3 (B.M. 21901) and the Harran 

inscription Nabon. H 1,B, also known as the Adad-guppi’ stele 

(Nabon. No. 24 in Tadmor’s list). The chronicle states that in the 

“sixteenth year” of Nabopolassar, in the month Marheshwan (parts 

of October and November), “the Umman-manda (the Medes), 

[who] had come [to help the king of Akkad, put their armies together 

and marched to Harran [against Ashur-uball]it (II) who had 

ascended the throne in Assyria. . . . The king of Akkad reached 

Harran and [. ..] he captured the city. He carried off the vast booty 

of the city and the temple. ”49 The Adad-guppi’ stele gives the same 

information: 

Whereas in the 16th year of Nabopolassar, king of Babylon, 

Sin, king of the gods, with his city and his temple was angry and 

went up to heaven—the city and the people that (were) in it went 

to ruin. 50 

Thus it is obvious that Nabonidus reckons the “fifty-four years” 

from the sixteenth year of Nabopolassar to the beginning of his 

own reign when the gods commanded him to rebuild the temple. 51 

This is in excellent agreement with the figures for the Neo- 

Babylonian reigns given by Berossus and the Royal Canon. As 

49 Grayson, ABC (1975), p. 95. The exact month for the destruction of the temple is 

not given, but as the chronicle further states that the king of Akkad went home in 

the month of Adar (the twelfth month, corresponding to February/March), the 

destruction must have occurred some time between October, 610 and March, 609 

B.C.E., probably towards the end of this period. 

50 C. J. Gadd, “The Harran Inscriptions of Nabonidus,” in Anatolian Studies, Vol. VIII, 

1958, p. 47. That the temple Éhulhul was laid in ruins at this time is confirmed by 

other inscriptions, including the Sippar Cylinder (No.1 in Tadmor’s list) which says: 

“(Sin) became angry with that city [Harran] and temple [Éhulhul]. He aroused the 

Medes ,who destroyed that temple and turned it into ruins”—Gadd, ibid., pp. 72, 

73; Beaulieu, op. cit., p.58. 

51 The rebuilding of the temple Ehulhul is referred to in a number of texts which are 

not easily harmonized. Owing to some vagueness in the inscriptions, it is not clear 

whether the Harran temple was completed early in Nabonidus’ reign or after his 

ten year stay at Teima in Arabia. The problem has been extensively discussed by a 

number of scholars. Most probably, the project was started in the early years of 

Nabonidus’ reign, but could not be completely finished until after his return from 

Teima, perhaps in his thirteenth regnal year or later. (Beaulieu, op. cit., pp. 137, 

205–210, 239–241.) “The different texts surely refer to different stages of the 

work,” says Professor Henry Saggs in his review of the problem. (H. W. F. Saggs, 

Peoples of the Past: Babylonians, London: The Trustees of the British Museum, 

1995, p. 170) Anyway, all scholars agree that Nabonidus reckons the fifty-four 

years from the sixteenth year of Nabopolassar unt1 his own accession-year when 

the “wrath” of the gods “did (eventually) calm down,” according to the Hillah stele 

(col. vii), and Nabonidus “was commanded” to rebuild the temple. For additiona1 

comments on the Hillah stele, see the Appendix.


Nabopolassar reigned for twenty-one years, five years remained from 

his sixteenth year to the end of his reign. After that 

Nebuchadnezzar ruled for forty-three years, Awel-Marduk for two, and 

Neriglissar for four years before Nabonidus came to power (Labashi- 

Marduk’s few months may be disregarded). 

Summing up these regnal years (5+43+2+4) we get fifty-four 

years-exactly as Nabonidus states on his stele. 

If, as has been established, Nabonidus’ first year was 555/554 

B.C.E., Nabopolassar’s sixteenth year must have been 610/609, his 

first year 625/624 and his twenty-first and last year 605/604 B.C.E. 

Nebuchadnezzar’s first year, then, was 604/603, and his eighteenth 

year, when he desolated Jerusalem, was 587/586 B.C.E.―not 607 

B.C.E. These dates agree completely with the dates arrived at from 

Berossus’ figures and the Royal Canon. 

Consequently, this stele adds its testimony in establishing the 

total length of the reigns of all the Neo-Babylonian kings prior to 

Nabonidus. The strength of this evidence―produced right during 

the Neo-Babylonian era itself―cannot be insisted upon too 

strongly. 

(3) Nabon. No. 24, also known as the Adad-guppi’ inscription, exists 

in two copies. The first was discovered in 1906 by H. Pognon at 

Eski Harran in south-eastern Turkey, in the ruins of the ancient 

city of Harran (known as Haran in Abraham’s time). The stele, now 

in the Archaeological Museum at Ankara, is a grave inscription, 

evidently composed by Nabonidus for his mother, Adad-guppi’. 

The text not only includes a biographical sketch of Nabonidus’ 

mother from the time of Assyrian king Ashurbanipal and on to the 

ninth year of Nabonidus (when she died), but also gives the length 

of reign of each of the Neo-Babylonian kings except, of course, of 

Nabonidus himself, who was still living. Unfortunately, in the first 

copy the portion of the text setting out the reigns is damaged, and 

the only readable figures are the forty-three years of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s reign and the four years of Neriglissar’s reign. 52 

However, in 1956 Dr. D. S. Rice discovered three other stelae at 

Harran from the reign of Nabonidus, one of which bore a duplicate 

inscription of the one discovered in 1906! Fortunately, the sections of 

52 For an extensive discussion of the inscription, see B. Landsberger, “Die Basaltstele 

Nabonids von Eski-Harran,” in Halil-Edhem Hâtira Kitabi, Kilt I (Ankara: Turk Tarih 

Kurumu Basimevi, 1947), pp. 115–152. An English translation is included in 

Pritchard’s ANET, pp. 311, 312. In ANET the translation of stele H 1, A, col. II says 

“6th” year of Nabonidus, which is an error for “9th”. The original text clearly has 

“9th” year’.

114 THE GENTILE TIMES RECONSIDERED


the new stele containing the chronological information were not 

damaged. The first of these sections reads as follows: 

From the 20th year of Ashurbanipal, king of Assyria, when I 

was born, until the 42nd year of Ashurbanipal, the 3rd year of his 

son Ashur-etil-ili, the 21st year of Nabopolassar, the 43rd year of 

Nebuchadnezzar, the 2nd year of Awel-Merodach, the 4th year of 

Neriglissar, during (all) these 95 years in which I visited the temple 

of the great godhead Sin, king of all the gods in heaven and in the 

nether world, he looked with favor upon my pious good works 

and listened to my prayers, accepted my vows. 53 

It should be observed that the first two kings, Ashurbanipal and 

his son Ashur-etil-ili, were Assyrian kings, while the following kings 

were Neo-Babylonian kings. This indicates that Adad-guppi’ first 

lived under Assyrian rule but then, in connection with 

Nabopolassar’s revolt and liberation of Babylonia from the 

Assyrian yoke, was brought under Babylonian rule. 54 Nabonidus’ 

mother lived to be a centenarian, and further on in the text a 

complete summary of her long life is given: 

He [the moon god Sin] added (to my life) many days (and) years 

of happiness and kept me alive from the time of Ashurbanipal, king 

of Assyria, to the 9th year of Nabonidus, king of Babylon, the son 

53 C. J. Gadd, op. cit., pp. 46–56. Gadd translated the inscription in 1958 and titled 

the new stele Nabon. H 1, B, as distinguished from Pognon’s stele which he titled 

Nabon. H 1, A. The quotation here is from the translation of A. Leo Oppenheim in 

James B . Pritchard (ed.), The Ancient Near East. A New Anthology of Texts and 

Pictures, Vol. II (Princeton and London: Princeton University Press, 1975), pp. 105, 

106, col. I:29–33. As this passage is used as the basis for the calculation of Adadguppi’s 

age in col. II:26–29, the number of kings and their reigns are evidently 

meant to be complete. In a second portion the chronological information is repeated 

(col. II:40–46), but the reign of Awel-Marduk is left out, evidently because the 

purpose of this section is different, viz., to explain which of the Neo-Babylonian 

kings Adad-guppi’ had served as an obedient subject. This is clearly indicated in 

the beginning of the section, which says: “I have obeyed with all my heart and have 

done my duty (as a subject) during ... ,” etc. As suggested by Gadd “she was 

banished, or absented herself,” from the court of Awel-Marduk, “no doubt for 

reasons, whatever they were, which earned that king an evil repute in the official 

tradition.” (Gadd, op. cit., p. 70) 

54 Nabonidus and his mother descended from the northern branch of the Aramaeans, 

who earlier had been so thoroughly assimilated into the Assyrian society that even 

their moon-god Sin “came to be honored among the Assyrians on an equal plane 

with their native god Assur.” (M. A. Dandamaev, Slavery in Babylonia, DeKalb, 

Illinois: Northern Illinois University Press, 1984, pp. 36–39.) In one of his 

inscriptions (Nabon. No. 9 in Tadmor’ s arrangement), Nabonidus explicitly speaks 

of the Assyrian kings as “my royal ancestors.” — H. Lewy, op. cit. (cf. note 42 

above), pp. 35, 36.


whom I bore, (i.e.) one hundred and four happy years (spent) in 

that piety which Sin, the king of all gods, has planted in my heart’. 55 

This queen died in the ninth year of Nabonidus, and the 

mourning for the deceased mother is described in the last column 

of the inscription. Interestingly, the same information is also given 

in the Nabonidus Chronicle (B.M. 35382): 

The ninth year: . . . On the fifth day of the month Nisan the 

queen mother died in Dur-karashu which (is on) the bank of the 

Euphrates upstream from Sippar. 56 

All the reigns of the Neo-Babylonian kings are given in this royal 

inscription, from Nabopolassar and on to the ninth year of 

Nabonidus, and the lengths of reign are in complete accordance with the 

Royal Canon—a very significant fact, because the corroboration 

comes from a witness contemporary with all these Neo-Babylonian kings 

and intimately connected with all of them! 57 More so than the 

individual testimony of any one source, it is the harmony of all 

these sources which is most telling. 

55 Oppenheim in Pritchard, op. cit. (1975), p. 107, col. II:26–29. For additional 

comments on the Adad-guppi’ inscription, see the Appendix for Chapter 3. 

56 Grayson, ABC, p. 107. Until the last column (III 5ff.), the Adad-guppi’ stele is 

written in the first person. But it is evident that the inscription was chiselled out 

after her death, undoubtedly by order of Nabonidus. That is why Dr. T. Longman 

III would like to classify it as a “fictional autobiography” (a 1iterary method known 

also from other Akkadian texts), although he adds: “This, however, does not mean 

that the events and even the opinions associated with Adad-guppi’ are 

unauthentic.” (Tremper Longman III, Fictional Akkadian Autobiography, Winona 

Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 1991, pp. 41, 101, 102, 209, 210; cf. Beaulieu, op. 

cit., p. 209.) But it is questionable if the Adad-guppi’ inscription, even in this 

sense, can be classified as a “fictional autobiography” In his review of Longman’s 

work Dr. W. Schramm points out that the text “essentially is a genuine 

autobiography. The fact that there is an addition in col. III 5ff. composed by 

Nabonidus (so already Gadd, AnSt 8, 55, on III 5), does not give anyone the right to 

regard the whole text as fictional. The inscription, of course, was chiselled out after 

the death of Adad-guppi’. But it cannot be doubted that an authentic Vorlage on 

the story of Adad-guppi’s life was used “—Bibliotheca Orientalis, Vol. LII, No. 1/2 

(Leiden, 1995), p.94. 

57 The Royal Canon, of course, does not give the reigns of the Assyrian kings 

Ashurbanipal and Ashur-etil-ili. For the earliest period (747–539 B.C.E.) the 

Canon gives a kinglist for Babylon, not for contemporary Assyria. The reigns of 

Assyrian kings are given only in so far as they also ruled directly over Babylon, 

which was true, for example, of Sennacherib, who ruled over Babylon twice (in 

704/03–703/02 and 688/87–681/80 B.C.E.), and of Esarhaddon, who ruled over 

Babylon for thirteen years (680/79–668/ 67 B.C.E.). For the period of 

Ashurbanipal’s reign in Assyria, the Canon gives the reigns of the contemporary 

vassal kings in Babylon, Shamash-shum-ukin (20 years) and Kandalanu (22 

years).—Compare Gadd, op. cit., pp. 70, 71.


The results from our discussion of the Neo-Babylonian 

historical records are summarized in the following table. 

TABLE 3: THE REIGNS OF THE NEO-BABYLONIAN KINGS 

ACCORDING TO THE NEO-BABYLONIAN HISTORICAL RECORDS 

ROYAL THE NEO-BAB. THE URUK THE ROYAL B.C.E. 

NAME CHRONICLES KING LIST INSCRIPTIONS DATES 

Nabopolassar 21 years 21 years 21 years 625–605 

Nebuchadnezzar 43 years* 

Awel-Marduk 2 years* 

43 (ye)ars 

2 (ye)ars 

43 years 

2 years 

604–562 

561–560 

Neriglissar 4 years* ‘3’ (y’s)+8 m’s 4 years 559–556 

Labashi-Marduk some months* 3 months — 556 

Nabonidus ‘17 years’ ‘17?’ (years) 17 years 555–539 

* These figures in the chronicles are preserved only via Berossus and/or the 

Royal Canon. See discussion. 

As may be seen from the table, the Neo-Babylonian chronology 

adopted by secular historians is very strongly supported by the 

ancient cuneiform sources, some of which were produced during 

the Neo-Babylonian era itself. Three different lines of evidence in 

support of this chronology are provided by these sources: 

(1) Although important parts of the Neo-Babylonian Chronicles are 

missing and some figures in the Uruk kinglist are partially damaged, 

the combined witness of these documents strongly supports the Neo- 

Babylonian chronologies of Berossus and the Royal Canon, both of 

which were actually— independently of each other—derived from 

Neo-Babylonian chronicles and kinglists. 

(2) The royal inscription Nabon. No. 18 and the Royal Chronicle 

fix the second year of Nabonidus astronomically to 554/53 B.C.E. 

The whole length of the Neo-Babylonian period prior to 

Nabonidus is given by Nabon. No. 8, which gives the elapsed time 

from the sixteenth year of Nabopolassar up to the accession-year 

of Nabonidus as fifty-four years. The stele thus fixes the sixteenth 

year of Nabopolassar to 610/09 and his first year to 625/24 B.C.E. 

These two inscriptions, therefore, establish the length of the whole 

Neo-Babylonian era. 

(3) The Adad-guppi’ inscription gives the reigns of all the Neo- 

Babylonian kings (except for Labashi-Marduk’s brief, months-long 

reign, which may be disregarded) from Nabopolassar up to the 

ninth year of Nabonidus. As the Watch Tower Society indirectly 

accepts a seventeen-year rule for Nabonidus, this stele of itself 

overthrows their 607 B.C.E. date for the desolation of Jerusalem.


Thus the Babylonian chronicles, the Uruk kinglist, and the royal 

inscriptions firmly establish the length of the Neo-Babylonian era. 

And yet this is just a beginning. We must still wait to be introduced to 

the strongest lines of evidence in support of the chronology 

presented in the table above. Their added testimony should 

establish beyond any reasonable question the historical facts of the 

matter. 

B-2: Economic-administrative and legal documents 

Literally hundreds of thousands of cuneiform texts have been 

excavated in Mesopotamia since the middle of the nineteenth 

century. 

The overwhelming majority of them concern economicadministrative 

and private legal items such as promissory notes, 

contracts (for the sale, lease, or gift of land, houses, and other 

property, or for the hiring of slaves and livestock), and records of 

law suits. 

These texts are to a great extent dated just as are commercial 

letters, contracts, receipts and other vouchers today. The dating is 

done by giving the year of the reigning king, the month, and the day of the 

month. A text concerning ceremonial salt from the archives of the 

temple Eanna in Uruk, dated in the first year of Awel-Marduk (the 

Evil-merodach of 2 Kings 25:27–30, written Amel-Marduk in 

Akkadian but postvocalic m was pronounced w), is given here as 

an example: 

Ina-sillâ has brought one and one-half talents of 

salt, the regular sattukku offering of the month of 

Siman for the god Usur-amassu. 

Month of Simanu, sixth day, first year of Amel- 

Marduk, the king of Babylon. 58 

Tens of thousands of such dated texts have been unearthed 

from the Neo-Babylonian period. According to the well-known 

Russian Assyriologist M. A. Dandamaev, over ten thousand of these 

texts had been published prior to 1991. 59 Many others have been 

published since, but the majority of them are still unpublished. 

Professor D. J. Wiseman, another leading Assyriologist, estimates 

58 Ronald H. Sack, Amel-Marduk 562–560 B.C. (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener 

Verlag, 1972), p. 79. 

59 Dr. M. A. Dandamaev states: “The period of less than ninety years between the 

reign of Nabopolassar and the occupation of Mesopotamia by the Persians is 

documented by tens of thousands of texts concerning household and 

administrative economy and private law, over ten thousand of which have been 

published so far.”— The Cambridge Ancient History, 2nd ed., Vol. III:2 (Cambridge: 

Cambridge University Press, 1991), p. 252.


that “there are probably some 50,000 texts published and 

unpublished for the period 627–539” B.C.E. 60 

Thus there exist large numbers of dated tablets from every year 

during the whole Neo-Babylonian era. Dr. Wiseman’s estimate would 

give an average of nearly 600 dated texts from each of the eightyseven 

years from Nabopolassar to Nabonidus, inclusive. 

It is true that among these texts there are many that are damaged 

or fragmentary, and that dates are often illegible or missing. 

Further, the texts are not evenly distributed throughout the period, 

as the number gradually increases and culminates in the reign of 

Nabonidus. 

Nonetheless, every single year throughout the whole period is covered by 

numerous, often hundreds of tablets that are datable. 

Because of this abundance of dated texts modern scholars are 

able to determine not only the length of reign of each king, but also 

the time of the year when each change of reign occurred, sometimes almost 

to the day! 

The last known texts from the reign of Neriglissar, for example, 

are dated I/2/4 and I?/6/4 (that is, month I, day 2 and day 6, year 

4, corresponding to April 12 and 16, 556 B.C.E., Julian calendar), 

and the earliest one from the reign of his son and successor, 

Labashi-Marduk, is dated I/23/acc. (May 3, 556). 61 The last text 

from the reign of Nabonidus is dated VlI/17/17 (October 13, 

539), or one day after the fall of Babylon (given as VII/16/17 in 

60 Private letter Wiseman-Jonsson, dated August 28, 1987. This is probably a very 

conservative estimate. The most extensive collection of Neo-Babylonian texts is 

held in the British Museum, which includes some 25,000 texts dated to the period 

626–539 B .C.E. Most of these belong to the “Sippar collection,” which contains 

tablets excavated by Hormuzd Rassam at the site of ancient Sippar (present Abu 

Habbah) in the years 1881 and 1882. This collection has recently been catalogued. 

(E. Leichty et al, Catalogue of the Babylonian Tablets in the British Museum, Vols. 

VI–VIII, London: British Museum Publications Ltd, 1986–1988. These catalogues 

will hereafter be referred to as CET.) Substantial collections are also in Istanbul 

and Baghdad. Many other collections of Neo-Babylonian documents are held in 

museums and at universities in the U.S.A., Canada, England, France, Germany, 

Italy, and other parts of the world. It is true that many of the tablets are damaged 

and the dates are often illegible. Yet, there are still tens of thousands of Neo- 

Babylonian tablets with legible dates extant today. As a result of the continuous 

archaeological excavations that are being carried out in the Mesopotamian area, 

“the body of written sources expands significantly every year. For example, in the 

space of a single season of excavations in Uruk, about six thousand documents 

from the Neo-Babylonian and Achaemenid periods were discovered.”—M. A. 

Dandamaev, Slavery in Babylonia (DeKalb, Illinois: Northern Illinois University 

Press, 1984), pp. 1, 2. 

61 R. A. Parker and W. H. Dubberstein, Babylonian Chronology: 626 B.C.–A.D. 75 

(Providence: Brown University Press, 1956), pp. 12, 13.


the Nabonidus Chronicle). The reason for the overlap of one day 

beyond Babylon’s fall is easily explained: 

Interestingly enough, the last tablet dated to Nabunaid from 

Uruk is dated the day after Babylon fell to Cyrus. News of its 

capture had not yet reached the southern city some 125 miles 

distant. 62 

In view of this immense amount of documentary evidence, the 

question must be asked: If twenty years have to be added to the 

Neo-Babylonian era in order to place the destruction of Jerusalem 

in 607 B.C.E., where are the business and administrative texts dated in those 

missing years? 

Quantities of dated documents exist for each of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s forty-three years, for each of Awel-Marduch’s 

(Evil-Merodach) two years, for each of Neriglissar’s four years, 

and for each of Nabonidus’ seventeen regnal years. In addition, 

there are many dated texts from Labashi-Marduk’s reign of only 

about two months. 

If any of these kings’ reigns had been longer than those just 

mentioned, large numbers of dated documents would certainly 

exist for each of those extra years. Where are they? Twenty years are 

about one fifth of the whole Neo-Babylonian period. Among the 

tens of thousands of dated tablets from this period, many thousands 

ought to have been found from those missing twenty years. 

If one casts one die (of a pair of dice) tens of thousands of times 

without ever getting a 7, he must logically conclude: “There is no 

number 7 on this die.” The same is true of the Watch Tower’s 

twenty missing “ghost years” for which one must look in vain 

during the Neo-Babylonian period. 

But suppose that a number of missing years really existed, and 

that, by some incredible chance, the many thousands of dated 

tablets that ought to be there have not been found. Why is it, then, 

that the lengths of reign according to the dated tablets which have 

been unearthed happen to agree with the figures of Berossus, those of 

the Royal Canon, of the Uruk King List, of the contemporary royal 

62 Ibid., p. 13. One text from the reign of Nabonidus, published by G. Continua in 

Textes Cuneiformes, Tome XII, Contrats Néo-Babyloniens, I (Paris: Librarie 

Orientaliste, 1927), Pl. LVIII, No. 121, apparently gives him a reign of eighteen 

years. Line 1 gives the date as “VI/6/17,” but when it is repeated in line 19 in the 

1ext it is given as “VI/6/ 18” Parker and Dubberstein (p. 13) assumed “either a 

scriba1 error or an error by Contenau.” The matter was settled by Dr. Beatrice 

André’, who at my request collated the original at the Louvre Museum in Paris in 

1990: “The last line has, 1ike the first, the year 17, and the error comes from 

Contenau.”—Letter André-Jonsson, March 20, 1990.


inscriptions, as well as the figures of all the other evidence that is 

yet to be presented below? Why should it be that, whatever type of 

historical source is considered, the supposedly “missing” years 

consistently amount to exactly twenty years? Why not a period of, 

in one case, seventeen years, in another case thirteen, in yet another 

seven years, or perhaps different isolated years distributed 

throughout the Neo-Babylonian period? 

Each year new quantities of dated tablets are unearthed, and 

catalogues, transliterations, and translations of such texts are 

frequently published, but the twenty missing years never turn up. 

Even improbability has a limit 63 

The importance of the economic-administrative and legal texts 

for the chronology of the Neo-Babylonian period can hardly be 

overestimated. The evidence provided by these dated texts is 

simply overwhelming. The reigns of all the Neo-Babylonian kings 

are copiously attested by tens of thousands of such documents, all 

of which were written during this era. As shown by the table 

below, these reigns are in full agreement with the Royal Canon and 

the other documents discussed earlier. 

TABLE 4: THE NEO-BABYLONIAN CHRONOLOGY ACCORDING 

TO THE ECONOMIC-ADMINISTRATIVE AND LEGAL DOCUMENTS 

Nabopolassar 21 years (625 – 605 BCE) 

Nebuchadnezzar 43 years (604 – 562 BCE) 

Awel-Marduk 2 years (561 – 560 BCE) 

Neriglissar 4 years (559 – 556 BCE) 

Labashi-Marduk 2–3 months ( 556 BCE) 

Nabonidus 17 years (555 – 539 BCE) 

B-3: Prosopographical evidence 

Prosopography (from the Greek word prósopon, meaning “face, 

person”) may be defined as “the study of careers, especially of 

individuals linked by family, economic, social, or political 

relationships. ”64 

63 As a matter of course, defenders of the Watch Tower Society’s chronology have 

made great efforts to discredit the evidence provided by these enormous quantities 

of dated cuneiform tablets. On perusing modern catalogues of documents dated to 

the Neo-Babylonian era, they have found a few documents that seemingly give 

longer reigns to some Babylonian kings than are shown by the Royal Canon and 

other sources. A fresh check of the original tablets, however, has shown that most 

of these odd dates simply are modern copying, transcription, or printing errors. 

Some other odd dates are demonstrably scribal errors. For a detailed discussion of 

these texts, see Appendix for chapter 3: “Some comments on copying, reading, and 

scribal errors” 

64 Webster’s New World Dictionary, 3rd college edition, eds. V. Neufeldt & D. B. 

Guralnik (New York: Webster’s New World Dictionaries, 1988), p. 1080.


As the names of many individuals often recur in the business and 

administrative documents—sometimes hundreds of times during 

the entire Neo-Babylonian period―scholars usually apply the 

prosopographical method in their analysis of these texts. Such an 

approach not only contributes to the understanding of the 

structure and social life of the Neo-Babylonian society, but it also 

provides additional, internal evidence in support of the established 

chronology of the period. 

Of the tens of thousands of documents from the Neo- 

Babylonian era, more than half are the results of temple activities 

and have been found in temple archives, particularly in the archives of 

the Eanna temple in Uruk (the temple of the goddess Ishtar) and 

the Ebabbar temple in Sippar (the temple of Shamash, the sun god). 

But many thousands of texts also come from private archives and 

libraries. 

The richest private archives are those of the Egibi and Nur-Sîn 

houses, centered in the Babylon area. Other private archives have 

been found, for example, in Uruk (the sons of Bel-ushallim, Nabûushallim, 

and Bel-supê-muhur), in Borsippa (the Ea-ilûta-bâni 

family), in Larsa (Itti-Shamash-balatu and his son Arad-Shamash), 

and in Ur (the Sîn-uballit family). 

No state archives have been found from the Neo-Babylonian 

period, the reason being that at this time such documents are 

known to have been written (in Aramaic) on leather and papyrus, 

materials that were easily destroyed by the climatic conditions in 

Mesopotamia. 65 

Consider now how a study of certain of the available archives 

can yield valuable information of a chronological nature. 

a) The Egibi business house 

By far the largest private archive of the Neo-Babylonian period is 

that of the Egibi business house. Of this enterprise Bruno Meissner 

says: 

From the firm the Sons of Egibi we possess such an abundance of 

documents that we are able to follow nearly all business 

transactions and personal experiences of its heads from the time of 

Nebuchadnezzar up to the time of Darius I. 66 

65 For a survey of the Neo-Babylonian archives, see M. A. Dandamaev’s article in 

Cuneiform Archives and Libraries, ed. K. R. Veenhof (Leiden: Nederlands 

Historisch-Archaeologisch Instituut te Istanbul, 1986), pp. 273–277. 

66 Bruno Meissner, Babylonien und Assyrien, Vol. II (Heidelberg, 1925), p. 331. The 

quotation is translated from the German.


The business documents from the Egibi house were discovered 

by Arabs during the wet season of the year 1875–76 in a mound in 

the neighbourhood of Hillah, a town about four miles southeast of 

the ruins of Babylon. Some three or four thousand tablets were 

discovered enclosed in a number of earthen jars, resembling 

common water jars, covered over at the top with a tile, and 

cemented with bitumen. 

The discoverers brought the tablets to Baghdad and sold them 

to a dealer there. In that same year George Smith visited Baghdad 

and acquired about 2,500 of these important documents for the 

British Museum. 

The tablets were examined during the following months by W. 

St. Chad Boscawen, and his report appeared in 1878 in the 

Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archaeology. 67 Boscawen states that 

the tablets “relate to the various monetary transactions of a 

Babylonian banking and financial agency, trading under the name 

of Egibi and Sons” The tablets “relate to every possible 

commercial transaction; from the loan of a few shekels of silver, to 

the sale or mortgage of whole estates whose value is thousands of 

mans of silver?” 68 

Boscawen soon realized the importance of following the sequence 

of the heads of the Egibi firm, and after a more careful analysis he 

ascertained the main lines of the succession to be as follows: 

From the third year of Nebuchadnezzar a person named Shula 

acted as head of the Egibi firm, and continued in that capacity for a 

period of twenty years, up to the twenty-third year of 

Nebuchadnezzar when he died and was succeeded by his son, 

Nabû-ahhe-iddina. 69 

The son, Nabû-ahhe-iddina, continued as the head of affairs for 

a period of thirty-eight years, that is, from the twenty-third year of 

Nebuchadnezzar to the twelfth year of Nabonidus when he was 

succeeded by his son Itti-Marduk-balatu. 70 

67 W. St. Chad Boscawen, “Babylonian Dated Tablets, and the Canon of Ptolemy,” in 

Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archaeology, Vol. VI (London, January 1878), 

pp. 1–78. As Boscawen points out (ibid., pp. 5, 6), George Smith himself, during 

his stay at Baghdad in 1876, had begun a systematic and careful examination of 

the tablets, a study that was interrupted by his untimely death in Aleppo in 

August that year. Boscawen’s study was evidently based on Smith’s notebooks.— 

Sheila M. Evers, “George Smith and the Egibi Tablets,” Iraq, Vol. LV, 1993, pp. 

107–117. 

68 1bid., p. 6. A “mana” (mina) weighed about 0.5 kg. 

69 Ibid., pp. 9, 10. Shula died between the dates VII/21/23 (month/day/year) and 

IV/15/24 of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign (between October, 582 and July, 581 B.C.E.). 

—G. van Driel, “The Rise of the House of Egibi,” Jaarbericht van het Vooraziatisch- 

Egyptisch Genootschap, No. 29 (Leiden, 1987), p. 51. 

70 Nabû-ahhê-iddina evidently died in the thirteenth year of Nabonidus, the year after 

his son had taken over the affairs. See Arthur Ungnad, “Das Haus Egibi,” Archiv 

für Orientforschung, Band XIV (Berlin, 1941), p. 60, and van Driel, op. cit., pp. 66, 

67.


Itti-Marduk-balatu in his turn remained head of the firm until 

the first year of Darius I (521/20 B.C.E.), which was the twentythird 

year of his headship of the firm. 

Boscawen epitomizes these findings as follows: 

Now, summing up these periods, we get the result that from 

the 3rd year of Nebuchadnezzar II to the 1st year of Darius 

Hystaspis was a period of eighty-one years: 

Sula at the head of the firm 

20 years 

Nabu-ahi-idina 

Itti-Marduk-balatu 

38 years 

23 years 

81 years 

This would give an interval of eighty-three years from the 1st 

year of Nebuchadnezzar to the 1st year of Darius Hystaspis. 71 

The significant fact is that this agrees exactly with Berossus, the 

Royal Canon, and the Neo-Babylonian historical records. Counting 

backwards eighty-three years from the first year of Darius I 

(521/20 B.C.E.) brings us to 604 B.C.E. as the first year of 

Nebuchadnezzar, which agrees completely with the other lines of 

evidence presented above. 

The archive of the Egibi-house alone would suffice to establish 

the length of the Neo-Babylonian period. With this extensive set of 

dated commercial tablets from the archive of one of the 

“Rothschilds” of Babylon “there ought to be but little difficulty in 

establishing once and for ever the chronology of this important 

period of ancient history,” wrote Boscawen already back in 1878. 72 

The evidence of these documents leaves no room for a gap in 

Neo-Babylonian history from Nebuchadnezzar onward, certainly 

not one of twenty years! The archive, containing tablets dated up to 

the forty-third year of Nebuchadnezzar, the second year of Awel- 

Marduk, the fourth year of Neriglissar and the seventeenth year of 

Nabonidus, gives a complete confirmation of the chronology of 

Berossus and the Royal Canon. 

Since the last century still other collections of tablets belonging 

to the Egibi family have been discovered. 73 A number of studies on 

71 Boscawen, op. cit., pp. 10, 24. This conclusion had also been arrived at previously 

by George Smith in his study of the tablets.—S. M. Evers, op. cit. (note 67 above), 

pp. 112–117. 

72 Boscawen, op. cit., p. 11. 

73 During excavations at Uruk in 1959–60, for example, an archive belonging to 

members of the Egibi family was unearthed, containing 205 tablets dating from the 

sixth year of Nabonidus to the thirty-third year of Darius I. Most of the tablets 

were dated as from the reign of Darius. See J. van Dijk, UVB 18 (cf. note 33 above), 

pp. 39–41. The earliest known text of the Egibi family is dated to 715 B.C.E. 

Business documents of the family then appear regularly between 690 and 480 

B.C.E.—M. A. Dandamaev, op. cit. (1984; see note 60 above), p.61.


the Egibi family have been produced, all of which confirm the 

general conclusions drawn by Boscawen. 74 Thanks to the 

enormous amount of texts from this family, scholars have been 

able to trace the history, not only of the heads of the firm, but also 

of many other members of the Egibi house, and even family trees 

have been worked out that extend through the whole Neo- 

Babylonian period and into the Persian era! 75 

The pattern of intertwined family relations that has been 

established in this way for several generations would be grossly 

distorted if another twenty years were inserted into the Neo- 

Babylonian period. 

b) Life expectancy in the Neo-Babylonian period 

(1) Adad-guppi’: 

As was shown above in the discussion of the Harran stele (Nabon. 

H 1, B), Adad-guppi’, the mother of Nabonidus, was born in the 

20th year of powerful Assyrian king Ashurbanipal, 649/648 B.C.E. 

She died in the ninth year of Nabonidus, in 547/546 B.C.E. at an 

age of 101 or 102 years, a remarkable life span. 76 

What would happen to her age if we were to add twenty years to 

the Neo-Babylonian era? This would necessarily increase the age of 

74 Some of the most important works are: Saul Weingort, Das Haus Egibi in 

neubabylonischen Rechtsurkunden (Berlin: Buchdruckerei Viktoria, 1939), 64 

pages; Arthur Ungnad, “Das Haus Egibi,” Archiv fur Orientforschung, Band XIV, 

Heft 1/2 (Berlin, 1941), pp. 57–64; Joachim Krecher, Das Geschäftshaus Egibi in 

Babylon in neubabylonischer und achämenidischer Zeit (unpublished 

“Habilitationsschrift,” Universitätsbibliothek, Munster in Westfalen, 1970), ix + 

349 pages.; and Martha T. Roth, “The Dowries of the Women of the Itti-Mardukbalatu 

Family,” Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 111:1,1991, pp. 19– 

37. 

75 See, for example, J. Kohler & F. E. Peiser, Aus dem Babylonischen Rechtsleben, IV 

(Leipzig: Verlag von Eduard Pfeiffer, 1898), p. 22, and M. T. Roth, op. cit., pp. 20, 

21, 36. Another private enterprise, the Nur-Sîn family, which through intermarriage 

became annexed to the Egibi family, has been thoroughly studied by Laurence 

Brian Shiff in The Nur-Sîn Archive: Private Entrepreneurship in Babylon (603–507 

B.C.) (Ph. D. dissertation; University of Pennsylvania, 1987), 667 pages. 

76 The Adad-guppi’ inscription itself stresses that her age was extreme: “I saw my 

[great] great-grandchildren, up to the fourth generation, in good health, and (thus) 

had my fill of extreme old age “ — A. Malamat, “Longevity: Biblical Concepts and 

Some Ancient Near Eastern Parallels,” Archiv fur Orientforschung, Beiheft 19: 

Vorträge gehalten auf der 28. Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale in Wien, 6.– 

10. Juli 1981 (Horn, Austria: Verlag Ferdinand Berger & Söhne Gesellschaft 

M.B.H., 1982), p. 217. Dr. Malamat also refers to a tablet found at Sultantepe 

which “categorizes the stages of life from age 40 through age 90 [as follows]: 40 — 

lalûtu (`prime of life’); 50 — umu kurûtu (`short life’); 60—metlutu (`maturity’); 70— 

umuarkûtu (long life’); [80]—shibutu Cold age’); 90 — littutu (èxtreme old age’).”—A. 

Malamat, ibid., p. 215.


Adad-guppi’ to 121 or 122 years. The only way to avoid this 

consequence would be to add the twenty extra years to the reign of 

her surviving son Nabonidus after her death, making his reign thirtyseven 

instead of seventeen years, something the contemporary 

documents simply do not allow us to do. 

This is not the only problem of this kind that confronts those 

who would defend the Watch Tower Society’s chronology. Many 

people, whose names appear in the business and administrative 

texts from the Neo-Babylonian period, can be traced from text to 

text almost during the entire period, sometimes even into the 

Persian era. We find that some of these people-businessmen, 

slaves, scribes―must have been eighty or ninety years old or more 

at the end of their careers. But if we were to add twenty years to 

the Neo-Babylonian era, we would also be forced to add twenty 

years to the lives of these people, making them 100 to 110 years 

old—and still active in their occupations. A few examples will 

follow. 

(2) Apla, son of Bel-iddina: 

A scribe named Apla, son of Bel-iddina, who belonged to the 

trading house of Egibi, appears for the first time as a scribe in a 

text dated to the twenty-eighth year of Nebuchadnezzar (577 

B.C.E.). Thereafter, his name recurs in many texts dated in the 

reigns of Nebuchadnezzar, Awel-Marduk, Neriglissar, Nabonidus, 

Cyrus, Cambyses, and Darius I. 

He appears for the last time as a witness in a document, a 

promissory note, dated to the thirteenth year of Darius, 509 B.C.E. 

That means the career of this scribe may be followed for a period 

of sixty-eight years, from 577 to 509 B.C.E. The Russian 

Assyriologist M. A. Dandamaev comments: 

He should have been, at least, twenty years old when he became 

a scribe. Even if we assume that Apla died even in the same year 

when he was referred to for the last time or soon after, he must 

have lived about 90 years. 77 

But if we allow twenty years to be added to the Neo-Babylonian 

era, we would not only increase Apla’s age to 110 years or 

more―we would also be forced to conclude that at this old age he 

was still active as a scribe. 

77 Muhammad A. Dandamaev, “About Life Expectancy in Babylonia in the first 

Millennium B.C.,” in Death in Mesopotamia (= Mesopotamia. Copenhagen Studies in 

Assyriology, Vol. 8), ed. Bendt Alster (Copenhagen: Akademisk Forlag, 1980), p. 

184.


(3) Iddina-Marduk and his wife Ina-Esagila-ramât 

Two other examples are the businessman Iddin-Marduk, son of Iqisha, 

of the family of Nur-Sin, and his wife Ina-Esagila-ramât. Iddin-Marduk 

appears as director of his business activities for the first time in a 

text that earlier had been dated to the eighth year of 

Nebuchadnezzar (597 B.C.E.). But a recent collation of the original 

tablet revealed that the year number is damaged and probably 

should be read as the 28th year (577 B.C.E.). Iddin-Marduk then 

appears in hundreds of dated documents, the last of which is from 

the third year of Cambyses, 527 B.C.E. Other documents indicate 

that he died shortly before the fifth year of Darius I (517 B.C.E.). 

If we assume that he was only twenty years old when he first 

appears as director, he must have been about eighty years old at the 

time of his death. 

Iddin-Marduk’s wife, Ina-Esagila-ramât, survived her husband. 

She, too, was involved in business activities. Documents show that 

she got married to Iddin-Marduk no later than the 33rd year of 

Nebuchadnezzar (572 B.C.E.). We must assume, therefore, that she 

was at least twenty years old when she first appears as a contracting 

party in a text dated to Nebuchadnezzar’s 34th year (571 B.C.E.). 

She appears for the last time in a text dated to the 15th year of 

Darius I (507 B.C.E.), at which time she must has been at least 84 

years old. 78 

Again, if we were to add twenty years to the Neo-Babylonian 

era, we would increase the age of Iddina-Marduk to about 100 

years, and the age of Ina-Esagila-ramât to at least 104 years. We 

would also be forced to hold that she, at this age, was still actively 

involved in the businesses. 

(4) Daniel the prophet: 

The Bible also provides some examples of its own. In the 

accession year of Nebuchadnezzar (605 B.C.E.), Daniel, then a 

youth of perhaps 15–20 years, was brought to Babylon (Daniel 1:1, 

4, 6). He served at the Babylonian court until after the end of the 

Neo-Babylonian period, being still alive in the third year of Cyrus, 

in 536/ 35 B.C.E. (Daniel 1:21; 10:1). At that time he must have 

been close to ninety years old. If another twenty years were added 

to this period, Daniel would have been nearly 110 years old. 

Is it really likely that people during the Neo-Babylonian period 

frequently reached ages of 100, 110, or even 120 years? True, we 

78 Cornelia Wunsch, Die Urkunden des babylonischen Geschäftsmannes Iddin- 

Marduk, 1 (Groningen: STYX Publications, 1993), pp. 19,10 ftn. 43, 12, 66.


sometimes have heard of people in southern Russia or northern 

India who are said to be 150 years old or more. But on close 

examination, all such statements have been proved to be false? 79 

The oldest known individual in modern times has been a French 

woman, Jeanne Calment, who was born on February 21, 1875, and 

died on August 4, 1997, at an age of 122 years? 80 This 

Frenchwoman’s record would have been equalled by Adadguppi’ , 

had that Babylonian woman been 122 years old when she died, 

instead of about 102, as the ancient records indicate. 

Considering these cases of exceptionally long age already 

presented, we rightly ask if we have any reason to believe that the 

life span of people at that time surpassed that of people of today? 

The Russian Assyriologist M. A. Dandamaev has examined the 

life span of people in Babylonia from the seventh through to the 

fourth century B.C.E., using tens of thousands of business and 

administrative texts as the basis for his research. His conclusion is 

that the life span of people at that time was not different from 

what it is now. In his discussion, Dandamaev refers to Psalms 

90:10: “As for the days of our life, they contain seventy years. Or if 

due to strength, eighty years” (NASB). These words were as true in 

the Neo-Babylonian era as they are today. 81 

Consequently, the extremely old ages which would be created by 

dating the destruction of Jerusalem to 607 instead of 587 B.C.E. 

provides one more argument weighing against the Watch Tower 

Society’s chronology. 

As has been shown in this section, a prosopographical examination 

of the cuneiform texts strongly supports the chronology 

established for the Neo-Babylonian period. The careers of business 

men, scribes, temple administrators, slaves, and others may be 

followed for decades, in some cases through almost the whole 

Neo-Babylonian period and on into the Persian era. Thousands of 

dated documents give a profound insight into their everyday 

activities. Notably, however, the lives and activities of these people 

never contain reference to any year lying outside the recognized 

time frame of the Neo-Babylonian period, never overlap or extend 

beyond this at any time so as to point to a single year of the 

twenty-year period required by the Watch Tower Society’s 

chronology. 

79 S. Jay Olshansky et al, “In Search of Methuselah: Estimating the Upper Limits of 

Human Longevity,” Science, Vol. 250, 2 November 1990. p. 635. 

80 The Guinness Book of Records 2004. According to some media reports, this record 

may have been beaten by a woman on Dominica, W. I., Elizabeth Israel, who is 

said to have been born on January 27, 1875, and died on October 14, 2003, at an 

age of 128 years. 

81 M. A. Dandamaev, op. cit. (1980), p. 183.


B-4: Chronological interlocking joints 

There are only two possible ways of extending the Neo-Babylonian 

period to include the twenty extra years required by the Watch 

Tower chronology: 

Either the known Neo-Babylonian kings had longer reigns than 

indicated by all the documents discussed above, or there were 

other, unknown kings who belonged to the Neo-Babylonian era in 

addition to those known to us from these documents. 

Both of these possibilities, however, are completely excluded, 

not only by the several lines of evidence presented so far and the 

astronomical evidence that will be discussed in the next chapter, 

but also by a series of texts that inseparably interlock each reign with 

the next throughout the whole Neo-Babylonian period. Eleven 

such chronological interlocking joints wil1 be discussed below. 

a) Nabopolassar to Nebuchadnezzar 

(1) In the earlier discussion of the Neo-Babylonian chronicles, one of 

them (Chronicle 5) was quoted as saying that Nabopolassar, the first 

Neo-Babylonian king, ruled “for twenty-one years,” that he died “on 

the eighth day of the month Ab [the fifth month] ,” and that on the first 

day of the next month (Elul) his son Nebuchadnezzar “ascended the 

royal throne in Babylon.” 

At this point, then, there is no room for a longer reign of 

Nabopolassar beyond the recognized span of twenty-one years, nor 

for an “extra king” between him and Nebuchadnezzar. 

b) Nebuchadnezzar to Awel-Marduk 

(2) That Nebuchadnezzar was succeeded by his son Awel-Marduk 

(the Biblical Evil-Merodach) in the forty-third year of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s reign is confirmed by a business document, 

B.M. 30254, published by Ronald H. Sack in 1972. 

This document mentions both the forty-third year of 

Nebuchadnezzar and the accession year of Awel-Marduk. A girl, 

Lit-ka-idi, the slave of Gugua, “was placed at the disposal of Nabûahhe-iddina, 

the son of Shulâ, the descendent of Egibi in the month 

of Ajaru [the second month], forty-third year of Nebuchadnezzar, king of 

Babylon, and (for whom) twelve shekels of silver served as 

security.” Later in the same year, “in the month of Kislimu [the ninth 

month], accession year of [Amel]-Marduk, king of Babylon, . . . Gugua


of her own will sold Lit-ka-idi to Nabû-ahhe-iddina for the full 

price of nineteen and one-half shekels of silver.” 82 

This document gives no room for a longer reign of 

Nebuchadnezzar, or for an “extra king” between him and Awel- 

Marduk. 

(3) In the Neo-Babylonian period the yield of a field or garden was 

often estimated before harvest time. After the harvest the workers 

of the field were to turn over the estimated amount to the owners 

or buyers. Quite a number of documents recording such 

procedures have been found. 

One of them, designated AO 8561, not only includes estimated 

yields of numerous fields for three successive years, the fortysecond 

and forty-third years of Nebuchadnezzar and the first year 

of Awel-Marduk, but “is also a record of what portions of that 

yield were received by and distributed to various persons . . . in the 

month of Kislimu [the ninth month], accession year of 

Neriglissar.” 83 

This document, then, provides another joint or dovetail between 

the forty-third year of Nebuchadnezzar and the reign of Awel- 

Marduk. 

(4) Another, similar text, YBC 4038, dated to the “month of Addaru 

[the twelfth month], 15th day, accession year of Amel-Marduk,” 

describes the monthly portioning out of “500 bushels of barley” at 

the Eanna temple in Uruk from “the 43rd year of Nabû-kudurriusur 

[Nebuchadnezzar]” to the “1st year of Amel-Marduk.” 84 

Again, this text ties together the reigns of Nebuchadnezzar and his 

successor Awel-Marduk in a way that gives no room for any 

additional years between the two. 

The Bible itself confirms that Awel-Marduk’s accession year fell 

in the forty-third year of his father Nebuchadnezzar. This may be 

inferred from the datings given in 2 Kings 24:12; 2 Chronicles 

82 Ronald Herbert Sack, Amel-Marduk 562–560 B.C. (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Verlag 

Butzon & Bercker Kevelaer, 1972), pp. 62, 63. 

83 Ibid., pp. 41, 116–118. The time interval from a harvest to the distribution of the 

yield was normally brief, a few years at the most. In the present case the yields of 

the three years’ harvests were distributed in the accession year of Neriglissar, that 

is, three years after the harvests of the first year. The insertion of twenty extra 

years somewhere between Nebuchadnezzar and Neriglissar would increase this 

time interval to twenty-three years—an extremely long wait for the yields, to say 

the least. 

84 Ronald H. Sack, “The Scribe Nabû-bani-ahi, son of Ibnâ, and the Hierarchy of 

Eanna as seen in the Erech Contracts,” Zeitschrift für Assyriologie, Band 67 

(Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1977), pp. 43–45.


36:10, and Jeremiah 52:28, 31. A brief discussion of this evidence is 

included in the “Appendix for Chapter 3” (page 325). 

c) Nebuchadnezzar to Awel-Marduk to Neriglissar 

(5) In the Neo-Babylonian period, bookkeeping was already an 

ancient, highly complex and formalized business. 85 An interesting 

example of this is a tablet known as NBC 4897. The document is, 

actually, a ledger, tabulating the annual growth of a herd of sheep 

and goats belonging to the Eanna temple at Uruk for ten consecutive 

years, from the thirty-seventh year of Nebuchadnezzar to the first year of 

Neriglissar. 

In the entries for each year the number of lambs and kids born 

during the year is added, and the number of animals killed 

(documented by their hides) or paid to the herdsmen as wages, are 

subtracted. The grand totals are then given in the column farthest 

to the right. Thus it is possible to follow the numerical increase of 

the herd year by year. The text shows that the herdsman 

responsible for the herd, Nabû-ahhe-shullim, during the ten years 

succeeded in enlarging the herd from 137 sheep and goats to 922 

animals. 86 

True, the Babylonian scribe made a few miscalculations and 

mathematical mistakes which partially hampers the interpretation 

of the document. 87 There is no doubt, however, that it is an annual 

record, as year numbers are given for each successive year. In the 

entry for the first year of Neriglissar, for example, the grand total 

column contains the following information: 

Grand total: 922, 1st year of Nergal-sharra-usur, king of Babylon, 9 

lambs in Uruk were received (and) 3 lambs for shearing. 

Similar information is given for each year from the thirtyseventh 

year of Nebuchadnezzar to his forty-third year, for the first 

85 Bookkeeping is as old as the art of writing. In fact, the oldest known script, the 

proto-cuneiform script, which emerged at Uruk (and usually is dated to about 3200 

B.C.E.), “was almost exclusively restricted to bookkeeping; it was an ‘accountant’s 

script’.” —H. J. Nissen, P. Damerow, & R. K. Englund, Archaic Bookkeeping 

(Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1993), p. 30. 

86 G. van Driel & K. R. Nemet-Nejat, “Bookkeeping practices for an institutional herd 

at Eanna,” Journal of Cuneiform Studies, Vol. 46:4, 1994, p.47. The form of recordkeeping 

used in the text “involves accumulating data with cross-footing the 

accounts in order to prove that all entries are accounted therein.”—Ibid.,p. 47, 

note 1. 

87 The errors occur in the totals, probably because the scribes had difficulties in 

reading the numbers in their ledgers.—Ibid., pp. 56, 57.


The "ledger" NBC 4897 

The document tabulates the annual growth of a herd of 

sheep and goats belonging to the Eanna temple at Uruk for 

ten successive years, from the 37th year of Nebuchadnezzar 

to the 1st year of Neriglissar (568-559 B.C.E.). — From G. 

van Driel & K. R. Nemet-Nejat, "Bookkeeping practices for 

an institutional herd at Eanna." Journal of Cuneiform Studies, 

Vol. 46:4, 1994, pp. 48, 49.


and second years of Awel-Marduk, and, as cited, for the first year 

of Neriglissar. 88 

This document, then, not only provides an additional 

confirmation of the lengths of reigns of Nebuchadnezzar and 

Awel-Marduk, but it also demonstrates that no extra kings or extra 

years can be inserted between Nebuchadnezzar and Awel-Marduk, 

or between Awel-Marduk and Neriglissar. 

d) Neriglissar to Labashi-Marduk 

(6) A cuneiform tablet in the Yale Babylonian collection, YBC 4012, 

not only shows that Labashi-Marduk succeeded Neriglissar as king, 

but also that he did this early in the fourth year of his father’s short 

reign. 

The document records that “in the month of Addaru [the 

twelfth month], 3rd year of Nergal-[sharra-usur], king of Babylon” 

(March–April, 556 B.C.E.), Mushezib-Marduk, the overseer of the 

Eanna temple in Uruk, carried a considerable amount of money to 

Babylon, partly as payment for work and material for the Eanna 

temple. This document was drawn up about two months later, 

evidently at Babylon before Mushezib-Marduk’s return to Uruk, 

and is dated to the “month of Ajaru [the second month of the next 

year], 22nd day, accession year of Labashi-Marduk, king of 

Babylon” (May 2, 556 B.C.E.). 89 

According to this document, Labashi-Marduk succeeded to the 

throne sometime in the first or second month of Neriglissar’s 

fourth year of reign. This is in good agreement with the evidence 

given by the contract tablets, which show that the demise of the 

crown occurred in the first month of Neriglissar’s fourth year. (See 

“Appendix for Chapter 3”, pages 326, 327.) 

88 For Nebuchadnezzar, only the year numbers are given. The royal names only 

appear with the first year of each king. There are two entries each for the thirtyseventh, 

thirty-eighth, and forty-first years (of Nebuchadnezzar), and no entries for 

his thirty-ninth and fortieth years. As pointed out by van Driel and Nemet-Nejat, 

“these errors can be easily explained: the outcome of the count for the previous 

year is the starting point for the inventory of the next year. That is, if the 

‘accountant’ had a complete file, he would find the same data in tablets dealing 

with consecutive years: once at the end of one text and again at the beginning of 

the succeeding text.” (Op. cit., p.54.) From the forty-first year of Nebuchadnezzar 

until the first year of Neriglissar, though, the dates follow a regular pattern. 

89 Ronald H. Sack, “Some Remarks on Sin-Iddina and Zerija, qipu and shatammu of 

Eanna in Erech . . . 562–56 B.C.,” Zeitschrift fur Assyriologie, Band 66 (Berlin, New 

York: Walter de Gruyter, 1976), pp. 287, 288. As mentioned earlier, in the 

Babylonian system the accession year of a king was the same as the last year of 

his predecessor. According to our text the accession year of Labashi-Marduk 

followed upon the third year of Neriglissar. Labashi-Marduk’s accession year, 

therefore, was also the fourth and last year of Neriglissar.


e) Neriglissar to Labashi-Marduk to Nabonidus 

(7) That Neriglissar was succeeded by his son Labashi-Marduk is 

plainly stated by Nabonidus in one of the royal inscriptions 

discussed earlier, Nabon. No. 8 (the Hillah stele). In column iv of this 

stele, Nabonidus relates that the cult of the goddess Anunitum in 

Sippar had been renewed by Neriglissar. Then he goes on saying: 

After (his) days had become full and he had started out on the 

journey of (human) destiny his son Labashi-Marduk, a minor (who) 

had not (yet) learned how to behave, sat down on the royal throne 

against the intentions of the gods and [three lines missing here]. 90 

After the three missing lines Nabonidus, in the next column, 

goes on to speak of his own enthronement, evidently as the 

immediate successor of Labashi-Marduk. In doing so, he also 

names the last four of his royal predecessors: Nebuchadnezzar and 

Neriglissar (whom he regarded as legitimate rulers), and their sons 

Awel-Marduk and Labashi-Marduk (whom he regarded as illegitimate 

usurpers). He states: 

They carried me into the palace and all prostrated themselves to 

my feet, they kissed my feet greeting me again and again as king. 

(Thus) I was elevated to rule the country by the order of my lord 

Marduk and (therefore) I shall obtain whatever I desire—there 

shall be no rival of mine! 

I am the real executor of the wills of Nebuchadnezzar and 

Neriglissar, my royal predecessors! Their armies are entrusted to 

me, I shall not treat carelessly their orders and I am (anxious) to 

please them [i.e. to execute their plans]. 

Awel-Marduk, son of Nebuchadnezzar, and Labashi-Marduk, 

son of Neriglissar [called up] their [troo]ps and ... their ... they 

dispersed. Their orders (7–8 lines missing). 91 

90 James B. Pritchard, Ancient Near Eastern Texts (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton 

University Press, 1950), p. 309. 

91 Ibid., p. 309. Berossus, whose Neo-Babylonian history was shown to be based on 

the Babylonian chronicles, gives a similar account of these events: “After Eveilmaradouchos 

had been killed, Neriglisaros, the man who had plotted against him, 

succeeded to the throne and was king for four years. Laborosoarchodos [Labashi- 

Marduk], the son of Neriglisaros, who was only a child, was master of the kingdom 

for nine [probably an error for “2”; see note 20 above] months. Because his 

wickedness became apparent in many ways he was plotted against and brutally 

killed by his friends. After he had been killed, the plotters met and jointly 

conferred the kingdom on Nabonnedus, a Babylonian and a member of the 

conspiracy.” — Stanley Mayer Burstein, The Babyloniaca of Berossus. Sources from 

the Ancient Near East, Vol.1, fascicle 5 (Malibu, Calif.: Undena Publications, 1978), 

p. 28.


This inscription, then, interlinks the reigns of Neriglissar and 

Labashi-Marduk, and evidently also those of Labashi-Marduk and 

Nabonidus. The possibility of inserting an “extra king” somewhere 

between these three kings is ruled out by this text. 

(8) Some legal documents, too, contain information that spans the 

reigns of two or more kings. One example is Nabon. No. 13, which 

is dated to “the 12th day of (the month) Shabatu [the eleventh 

month], the accession year of Nabonidus, king of Babylon 

[February 2, 555 B.C.E.]. “ The inscription tells about a woman, 

Belilitu, who brought up the following case before the royal court: 

Belilitu daughter of Bel-ushezib descendant of the messenger 

declared the following to the judges of Nabonidus, king of 

Babylon: ‘In the month of Abu, the first year of Nergal-shar-usur 

[Neriglissar], king of Babylon [August–September, 559 B.C.E.], I 

sold my slave Bazuzu to Nabu-ahhe-iddin son of Shula descendent 

of Egibi for one-half mina five shekels of silver, but he did not pay 

cash and drew up a promissory note.’ The royal judges listened (to 

her) and commanded that Nabu-ahhe-iddin be brought before 

them. Nabu-ahhe-iddin brought the contract that he had 

concluded with Belilitu and showed the judges (the document 

which indicated that) he had paid the silver for Bazuzu. 92 

Reference is thus made to the reigns of Neriglissar and that of 

Nabonidus. The generally accepted chronology would indicate that 

about three and a half years had passed since Belilitu had sold her 

slave in the first year of Neriglissar until she, in the accession year 

of Nabonidus, made a fraudulent but futile attempt to receive 

double payment for the slave. But if twenty years were to be added 

somewhere between the reigns of Neriglissar and Nabonidus, then 

Belilitu waited for twenty-three and a half years before she brought her 

case before the court, something that appears extremely unlikely. 

f) Nabonidus to Cyrus 

That Nabonidus was the king of Babylon when Cyrus conquered 

Babylonia in 539 B.C.E. is clearly shown by the Nabonidus Chronicle 

(B.M. 35382) 93 The chronicle evidently dated this event 

92 M. A. Dandamaev, Slavery in Babylonia (DeKalb, Illinois: Northern Illinois 

University Press, 1984), pp. 189, 190. 

93 As early as 1877, W. St. Chad Boscawen found a document among the Egibi 

tablets dated to the reign of Cyrus, “which stated that money was paid in the reign 

of ‘Nabu-nahid the former king’ .” — Transactions of the Society of Biblical 

Archaeology, Vol. VI (London, 1878), p. 29.


to the “seventeenth year” of Nabonidus, but as was pointed out 

earlier, this portion of the chronicle is damaged and the year 

number is illegible. Nonetheless, a whole group of economic texts 

has been found that provides chronological interlocking 

connections between Nabonidus’ seventeenth year and the reign of 

Cyrus . These include the tablets with the catalogue numbers 

CT 56:219, CT 57:52.3, and CT 57:56. 94 

(9) The first of the three documents (CT 56:219) is dated to the 

accession year of Cyrus, and the next two (CT 57:52.3 and CT 57:56) 

are dated to his first year. But all three tablets also refer to the 

preceding king’s “year 17,” and since it is accepted as fact that 

Nabonidus was the final king of the Neo-Babylonian line, 

preceding Cyrus the Persian’s rule, this confirms that Nabonidus’ 

reign lasted 17 years 95 

(10) One of the more graphic examples of a chronological linkage 

between two reigns is a cuneiform tablet in the archaeological 

museum at Florence known as SAKF 165. As Professor J. A. 

Brinkman points out, this document “presents a unique year-byyear 

inventory of wool stuffs made into garments for the cult 

statues of the deities in Uruk. . . . Furthermore, it covers the vital 

years before and after the Persian conquest of Babylonia.” 96 

The inventory is arranged chronologically, and the preserved 

portion of the text covers five successive years, from the fifteenth 

year of Nabonidus to the second year of Cyrus, with year numbers 

given at the end of the inventory for each year: 

Lines 3 – 13: year 15 [of Nabonidus] 

14 – 25: year 16 [of Nabonidus] 

26 – 33: year 17 [of Nabonidus] 

34 – 39: year 1 of Cyrus 

40 – : [year 2 of Cyrus] 

94 “CT 55–57” refers to the catalogues Cuneiform Texts from Babylonian Tablets in the 

British Museum, Parts 55–57, containing economic texts copied by T. G. Pinches 

during the years 1892 to 1894 and published by British Museum Publications 

Limited in 1982. 

95 Stefan Zawadzki, “Gubaru: A Governor or a Vassal King of Babylonia?,” Eos, Vol. 

LXXV (Wroclaw, Warszawa, Krakow, Gdansk, Lódz, 1987), pp. 71, 81; M. A. 

Dandamayev, Iranians in Achaemenid Babylonia (Costa Mesa, California and New 

York: Mazda Publishers, 1992), p. 91; Jerome Peat, “Cyrus ‘king of lands,’ 

Cambyses ‘king of Babylon’: the disputed co-regency,” Journal of Cuneiform 

Studies, Vol. 41/2, Autumn 1989, p. 209. It should be noted that one of the three 

tablets, CT 57:56, is dated to Cambyses as co-regent with Cyrus in his first year. 

96 J. A. Brinkman, “Neo-Babylonian Texts in the Archaeological Museum at Florence,” 

Journal of Near Eastern Studies, Vol. XXV, Jan.–Oct. 1966, p. 209.


The inventory tablet SAKF 165 

The text presents an inventory of wool stuff for five 

successive years, from Nabonidus’ 15th year to Cyrus’ 2nd 

year (541–537 B.C.E.). From Karl Oberhuber, Sumerische und 

akkadische Keilschriftsdenkmäler des Archäologischen Museums zu 

Florenz (Innsbruck, 1960). Obverse (above) and reverse 

(below).


The royal name was evidently given only for the first year of 

each ruler. But as the immediate predecessor of Cyrus was 

Nabonidus, “year 15”, “year 16”, and “year 17” clearly refer to his 

reign. The inventory of the year following upon “year 17” ends 

with the words, “year 1, Cyrus, King of Babylon, King of the 

Lands” (line 39). The last lines of the entry for the fifth year of 

inventory are damaged, and “year 2” (of Cyrus) can only be 

understood as implied. 97 

11) In ancient Mesopotamia, in the various temples the presence 

of the deities was represented by their statues. In times of war, 

when a city was taken, the temples were usually looted and the 

divine statues were carried away as “captives” to the land of the 

conquerors. 

As such captures were seen by the citizens as an omen that the 

gods had abandoned the city and called for its destruction, they 

often tried to protect the statues by moving them to a safer place at 

the approach of a military force. 

This is what happened shortly before the Persian invasion of 

northern Babylonia in 539 B.C.E., when according to the Nabonidus 

Chronicle Nabonidus ordered a gathering of the gods of several cities 

into Babylon. The same chronicle also tells that Cyrus, after the 

fall of Babylon, returned the statues to their respective cities. 98 

As discussed by Dr. Paul-Alain Beaulieu, there are several 

documents from the archive of the Eanna temple of Uruk which 

confirm that, in the seventeenth year of Nabonidus, the statue of 

Ishtar (referred to in the documents as “Lady-of-Uruk” or “Lady 

of the Eanna”) was brought upstream by boat on the river 

Euphrates to Babylon. Further, these documents also show that the 

regular offerings to this statue of Ishtar were not interrupted during 

her temporary stay at Babylon. Cargoes of barley and other kinds 

of foodstuff for her cult were sent from Uruk to Babylon. 

One example of this is given by a tablet in the Yale Babylonian 

Collection, YOS XIX:94, which is dated to the seventeenth year of 

Nabonidus and records a deposition before the assembly of the 

noblemen of Uruk: 

(These are) the mar banî [noblemen] in whose presence Zeriya, 

son of Ardiya, has thus spoken: Bazuzu, son of Ibni-Ishtar, 

97 Ibid., p. 209. A transliteration of the tablet is given by Karl Oberhuber in his 

Sumerische and akkadische Keilschriftdenkmäler des Archäologischen Museums zu 

Florenz (= Innsbruck Beiträge zur Kulturwissenschaft, Sonderheft 8, Innsbruck, 

1960), pp. 111–113. 

98 A. K. Grayson, ABC (1975), pp. 109, 110.


descendant of Gimil-Nanaya, has brought a boat from Babylon to 

lease it fo[r the sum of. . . . . . ], and he said thus: “I will take the 

barley for the regular offerings of the Lady-of-Uruk to Babylon.” 

. . . . . . 

City of the quay of Nanaya, domain of the Lady of Uruk: Month 

Abu [the fifth month] - Day 5 - Seventeenth year of Nabonidus, king of 

Babylon [= August 4, 539 B.C.E., Julian calendar]. 99 

These documents clearly demonstrate that Cyrus’ conquest of 

Babylon occurred in the seventeenth year of Nabonidus, which 

thus once again is proved to have been the last year of his reign. 

The many examples cited above demonstrate that the activity 

recorded in a text at times spans over and ties together two 

successive reigns. They also demonstrate that it is possible to 

establish the length of the entire Neo-Babylonian era by the aid of 

such “chronological joints” alone. In fact, the lengths of reign of 

some kings (Nebuchadnezzar, Nabonidus) are established by more 

than one text of this kind. 

C. SYNCHRONIC LINKS 

TO THE CHRONOLOGY OF EGYPT 

An excellent proof of the correctness of a chronology is when it is 

in agreement with the chronologies of other contemporary nations, 

provided that these other chronologies are independently 

established and there are synchronisms, that is, dated connecting 

links that serve to join the two or more chronologies together at 

one or more points. 

The reason why it is important that they be independently 

established is to rule out any attempt to discredit their worth by 

claiming that the chronology of a certain period in one nation has 

been established simply by the aid of the chronology of the 

contemporary period in another nation. 

During the Neo-Babylonian period there are at least four such 

synchronisms between Egypt and the kingdoms of Judah and 

Babylon. Three of these are given in the Bible, in 2 Kings 23:29 

(where Egyptian pharaoh Necho and Judean king Josiah appear), 

Jeremiah 46:2 (Necho, Nebuchadnezzar and Jehoiakim all 

appearing), and Jeremiah 44:30 (pharaoh Hophra, kings Zedekiah 

and Nebuchadnezzar listed). 

99 Paul-Alain Beaulieu, “An Episode in the Fall of Babylon to the Persians,” Journal of 

Near Eastern Studies, Vol. 52:4, October 1993, pp. 244, 245; cf. also Beaulieu, The 

Reign of Nabonidus, King of Babylon, 556–539 B.C. (New Haven and London: Yale 

University Press, 1989), pp. 221, 222.


The fourth is given in a cuneiform text, B.M. 33041, which refers 

to a campaign against Amasis, king of Egypt, in Nebuchadnezzar’s 

thirty-seventh regnal year. 100 The meaning of these synchronisms 

will be unravelled further on. 

C-1: The chronology of the Saite period 

The kings reigning in Egypt during the Neo-Babylonian period 

belonged to the Twenty-Sixth Dynasty (664–525 B.C.E.). The period 

of this dynasty is also referred to as the Saite period, as the pharaohs 

of this dynasty took the city of Sais in the Delta as their capital. 

If the four synchronisms mentioned above are to be of any 

definitive help to our study, it first needs to be shown that the 

chronology of that twenty-sixth dynasty of Egypt is fixed 

independently from the contemporary Neo-Babylonian chronology, 

and can thus stand on its own, as it were. 

This can be determined in a quite unusual way, of which Dr. F. 

K. Kienitz writes: 

The chronology of the kings of the 26th dynasty, from 

Psammetichus I onwards, is completely established through a 

series of death stelae and stelae of holy Apis bulls, which list the 

birth date in ‘Day x, Month y, Year z, of King A’ and the death 

date in ‘Day x, Month y, Year z, of King B’ , and also the length of 

life of the [bull or person] in question in years, months, and 

days? 101 

This means that, if a death stele says that a sacred Apis bull or a 

person was born in the tenth year of King A and died at the age of 

twenty-five in the twentieth year of King B, we know that King A 

ruled for fifteen years. 

100 B.M. 33041 was first published by T. G. Pinches in Transactions of the Society of 

Biblical Archaeology, Vol. VII (London, 1882), pp. 210–225. 

101 Friedrich Karl Kienitz, Die politische Geschichte Ägyptens vom 7. bis zum 4. 

Jahrhundert vor der Zeitwende (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1953), pp. 154, 155. 

(Translated from the German.) The Apis cult was practiced already in the First 

Dynasty of Egypt. At death the Apis bulls were mummified and buried in a coffin 

or (from the reign of Amasis onwards) in a sarcophagus made of granite. The 

burial place from the reign of Ramesses II onwards–a vast catacomb known as 

the “Serapeum” in Saqqara, the necropolis of Memphis–was excavated by A. 

Mariette in 1851. From the beginning of the Twenty-Sixth Dynasty and on the 

burials were marked by grave stelae with biographical data on the Apis bulls 

such as dates of installation and death and the age at death. — László Kákosy, 

“From the fertility to cosmic symbolism. Outlines of the history of the cult of 

Apis,” Acta Classica Universitatis Scientiarum Debrecenienses, Tomus XXVI 1990 

(Debrecini, 1991), pp. 3–7.


Grave stele of the 1st Apis of the 26th dynasty 

The inscription shows that the first Apis of the 26th dynasty was 

born in the 26th year of Taharqah and died in the 20th year of 

Psammetichus I at an age of 21 years, which shows that 

Taharqah ruled for 26 years. This is also confirmed by other 

inscriptions. — From Aug. Mariette, Le Sérapeum de Memphis 

(Paris: Gide, Libraire-Éditeur, 1857)


This is the kind of contemporary evidence to which Dr. Kienitz 

refers. A translation of Kienitz’ survey of this material is given 

here. 102 

1. GRAVE STELE OF THE 3RD APIS OF THE 26TH DYNASTY 

Date of Birth: Year 53 of Psammetichus I, Month 6, Day 19 

Installation: Year 54 of Psammetichus I, Month 3, Day 12 

Date of Death: Year 16 of Necho II, Month 2, Day 6 

Date of Burial: Year 16 of Necho II, Month 4, Day 16 

Length of Life: 

16 years, 7 months, 17 days 

Result: Length of reign of Psammetichus = 54 years. 

2. GRAVE STELE OF THE 4TH APIS OF THE 26TH DYNASTY 

Date of Birth: Year 16 of Necho II, Month 2, Day 7 

Installation: Year 1 of Psammetichus II, Month 11, Day 9 

Date of Death: Year 12 of Apries, Month 8, Day 12 

Date of Burial: Year 1.2 of Apries, Month 10, Day 21 



Result: As the date of Psammetichus II’s death is elsewhere attested as Year 7, 

Month 1, Day 23, 103 the length of Necho’s reign amounts to 15 years, that of 

Psammetichus II to 6 years. 

3. TWO GRAVE STELAE OF A PRIEST NAMED PSAMMETICHUS 

Date of Birth: Year 1 of Necho II, Month 11, Day 1 

Date of Death: Year 27 of Amasis, Month 8, Day 28 



Result: The sum of the lengths of reign of Necho II, Psammetichus II, and Apries 

= 40 years. As Necho II reigned for 15 years, and Psammetichus II for 6 years, 

Apries’ reign amounts to 19 years. 

4. GRAVE STELE OF ANOTHER PSAMMETICHUS 

Date of Birth: Year 3 of Necho II, Month 10, Day 1 or 2 

Date of Death: Year 35 of Amasis, Month 2, Day 6 



Result: The same as under 3. 

5. GRAVE STELE OF ONE BESMAUT 

Year of Birth: 

Year 18 of Psammetichus I 

Year of Death: 

Year 23 of Amasis 


99 years 

Result: The total of 94 years for the lengths of reign from Psammetichus I to 

Apries inclusive is once more confirmed. 

102 Kienitz, op. cit., pp. 155, 156. The grave stelae under no. 1, 2, and 3 were 

translated and published by James Henry Breasted in Ancient Records of Egypt, 

Vol. IV (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1906), pp. 497, 498, 

501–503, 518–520. For no. 4 and 5, see the references by Kienitz, op.cit., p. 156, 

notes 1 and 2. 

103 Lines 5/6 of the Ank-nes-nefer-ib-Re Stele. See G. Maspero, Ann. Serv. 5 (1904), 

pp. 85, 86, and the translation by J. H. Breasted, op. cit., IV, p. 505.


Consequently, these contemporary death stelae conclusively 

establish the lengths of reign of the first four kings of the twentysixth 

dynasty of Egypt as follows: 

Psammetichus I 

Necho II 

Psammetichus II 

Apries (= Hophra) 

54 years 

15 years 

6 years 

19 years 

For the last two kings of the twenty-sixth dynasty, Amasis and 

Psammetichus III, material of this kind unfortunately is lacking. 

However, both Greek historian Herodotus (c. 484–425 BCE.) and 

the Graeco-Egyptian priest and historian Manetho (active c. 300 

B.C.E.) give forty-four years to Amasis and six months to 

Psammetichus III. 104 And these lengths of reign have been 

confirmed by modem discoveries, as follows: 

In the papyrus Rylands IX (also called “Petition of Petiese”) 

dating from the time of Darius I (521–486 B.C.E.), the forty-fourth 

year of Amasis is mentioned in a context indicating it was his last 

full year. Each year, a prophet of Amun of Teuzoi 

(Psammetkmenempe by name) who lived in the Nile Delta, used to 

send a representative to fetch his stipend. This he did until the fortyfourth 

year of Amasis. This, in itself, is not decisive. But in the 

“Demotic Chronicle,” a report on the compilation of Egyptian 

laws written under Darius I, there are also two mentions of the 

forty-fourth year of Amasis as some sort of terminal point. Finally, 

the same figure is given in an inscription from Wâdi Hammâmât. 105 

The figure given by Herodotus and Manetho, therefore, is strongly 

supported by this combination of inscriptions. 

104 Manetho’s Egyptian History, which was written in Greek and probably was based 

on the temple archives, is preserved only in extracts by Flavius Josephus and 

Christian chronographers, especially by Julius Africanus in his Chronographia (c. 

221 C.E.) and by Eusebius of Caesarea in his Chronicon (c. 303 C.E.). Africanus, 

who transmits Manetho’s data in a more accurate form, gives forty-four years to 

Amasis and six months to Psammetichus III. This agrees with Herodotus’s 

figures.—W. G. Waddell, Manetho (London: Harvard University Press, 1948), pp. 

xvi–xx, 169–174. 

105 W. Spiegelberg, Die Sogenannte Demotische Chronik (Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs’sche 

Buchhandlung, 1914), p. 31; Kienitz, op. cit., p. 156; and Richard A. Parker, “The 

Length of Reign of Amasis and the Beginning of the Twenty-Sixth Dynasty,” 

Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts, Kairo Abteilung, XV, 1957, 

p. 210. For some time it was held that Amasis died in his forty-fourth regnal 

year, and because of the Egyptian nonaccession year system, whereby a king’s 

accession year was reckoned as his first regnal year, they gave Amasis only fortythree 

full years. But in 1957, in the article referred to above, R. A. Parker 

demonstrated conclusively that Amasis reigned for forty-four full years. This, of 

course, moved the reigns of the earlier kings of the Saite dynasty one year 

backwards. The beginning of the dynasty, therefore, was re-dated to 664 instead 

of 663 B.C.E., as had been held previously. (R. A. Parker, op. cit., 1957, pp. 208– 

212.) Since 1957, Parker’s conclusions have obtained general acceptance among 

scholars.—For additional information on the nonaccession year reckoning, see 

Appendix For Chapter Two: “Methods of reckoning regnal years.”


As to Psammetichus III, the highest date available for this king 

is Year Two. Three documents (papyri) dated to the third, fourth, 

and fifth months of his second year have been discovered. And yet, 

this is no contradiction to the statement made earlier that the rule 

of this king actually covered only six months. How so? 

The Egyptians used a nonaccession year system. According to 

this system the year in which a king came to power was reckoned as his 

first regnal year. Psammetichus III was dethroned by the Persian 

king Cambyses during his conquest of Egypt, generally dated to 

525 B.C.E. by the authorities. 106 At this time the Egyptian civil 

calendar year almost coincided with the Julian calendar year. 107 If 

the conquest of Egypt occurred in the sixth month of the reign of 

Psammetichus III, this must have been in May or June, 525 

B.C.E. 108 With this prerequisite, his six months of rule began at the 

end of the previous year, 526 B.C.E., quite possibly only a few days 

or weeks before the end of that year. Though he ruled for only a 

fraction of that year, this fraction of a few days or weeks was 

reckoned as his first regnal year according to the Egyptian 

nonaccession year system. Thereby his second regnal year began to 

count only a few days or weeks after his accession to the throne. 

Thus, although he ruled for only six months, documents dated up 

to the fifth month of his second year are, in view of the supporting 

evidence, only what we should expect to find. The following 

illustration makes the matter plain: 

106 Kienitz, op. cit., p. 157, note 2. This date is also accepted by the Watch Tower 

Society, as can be seen from Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 1 (1988), pp. 698, 

699. 

107 In the two years 526 and 525 B.C.E. the Egyptian civil calendar year began on 

January 2 in the Julian calendar.—Winfried Barta, “Zur Datierungspraxis in 

Ägypten unter Kambyses and Dareios I,” Zeitschrift für Ägyptische Sprache and 

Altertumskunde, Band 119:2 (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1992), p. 84. 

108 The exact time of the year for Cambyses’ capture of Egypt is not known. (Compare 

Molly Miller, “The earlier Persian dates in Herodotus,” in Klio, Band 37,1959, pp. 

30, 31.)—In the nineteenth century E. Revillout, one of the founders of the 

scholarly journal Revue Égyptologique in the 1870’s, claimed that Psammetichus 

III ruled for at least two years, as one document dated to the fourth year of a king 

Psammetichus seemed to be written at the end of the Twenty-Sixth Dynasty. 

(Revue Égyptologique, Vol. 3, Paris, 1885, p. 191; and Vol. 7, 1896, p. 139.) But 

since then many new documents have been discovered that make Revillout’s 

theory untenable. The document evidently refers either to one of the earlier kings 

known by the name of Psammetichus, or to one of the later vassal kings by that 

name. There were three kings by the name Psammetichus during the Saite 

period, and also two or three vassal kings by that name in the fifth century, and 

sometimes it has been difficult to decide which of them is referred to in a text. 

Some documents that an earlier generation of Egyptologists dated to the reign of 

Psammetichus III have later had to be re-dated. Wolfgang Helck & Wolfhart 

Westendorf (eds.), Lexikon der Ägyptologie, Band IV (Wiesbaden, 1982), pp. 1172– 

75.


As demonstrated by the discussion above, the chronology of the 

Twenty-Sixth Dynasty of Egypt is soundly and independently 

established. The results are summarized in the following table: 

CHRONOLOGY OF THE TWENTY-SIXTH DYNASTY: 

Psammetichus I 54 years 664 – 610 B.C.E. 

Necho II 

Psammetichus II 

15 

6 

610 – 595 

595 – 589 

Apries (= Hophra) 19 589 – 570 

Amasis 44 570 – 526 

Psammetichus III 1 526 – 525 

C-2: Synchronisms to the chronology of the Saite period 

Does the chronology of the Egyptian Saite period square with that 

of the Neo-Babylonian era as established above? Or, instead, does 

it harmonize with the chronology of the Watch Tower Society as 

presented, for example, in its Bible dictionary Insight on the Scriptures, 

Vol. 1, pages 462–466? 

The four synchronisms to the Egyptian chronology mentioned 

earlier (the first three of these coming from the Scriptures) decide 

the matter: 

First synchronism—2 Kings 23:29: In his [king Josiah’s] days 

Pharaoh Nechoh the king of Egypt came up to the king of Assyria 

by the river Euphrates, and King Josiah proceeded to go to meet 

him; but he put him to death at Megiddo as soon as he saw him. 

(NW) 

Here it is clearly shown that Judean king Josiah died at Megiddo 

in the reign of Pharaoh Necho of Egypt. According to the 

chronology of the Watch Tower Society, Josiah’s death took place 

in 629 B.C.E. (See Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 2, pp. 118, 483.) But 

according to clear historical evidence, Necho’s reign did not begin 

until nineteen years later, in 610 B.C.E. (see table above). 109 So Josiah’s 

death did not take place in 629 B.C.E. but twenty years later, in 

609. 110 

109 Helck & Westendorf, op. cit., Band IV, pp. 369–71. Necho succeeded to the throne 

at the death of his father Psammetichus I in the spring or summer of 610 B.C.E., 

but according to the Egyptian antedating method his first year was counted from 

the beginning of the Egyptian civil calendar year, which this year began on 

January 23 of the Julian calendar. —W. Barta, op. cit., p. 89. 

110 For a discussion of the exact date of Josiah’s death, see the final section of the 

Appendix: “Chronological tables covering the seventy years.”


Second synchronism—Jeremiah 46:2: For Egypt, concerning the 

military force of Pharaoh Necho the king of Egypt, who happened 

to be by the river Euphrates at Carchemish, whom 

Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon defeated in the fourth year of 

Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, the king of Judah. (NW) 

This battle in the “fourth year of Jehoiakim” is placed in the year 

625 B.C.E. by the Watch Tower Society (Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 

2, p. 483.), which again cannot be harmonized with the 

contemporary chronology of Egypt. But if this battle at 

Carchemish took place twenty years later, in the accession-year of 

Nebuchadnezzar, that is, in June, 605 B.C.E. according to all the 

lines of evidence presented earlier, we find this date to be in perfect 

harmony with the recognized reign of Pharaoh Necho, 610–595 

B.C.E. 

Third synchronism—Jeremiah 44:30: This is what Jehovah has said: 

‘Here I am giving Pharaoh Hophra, the king of Egypt, into the 

hand of his enemies and into the hand of those seeking for his 

soul, just as I have given Zedekiah the king of Judah into the hand 

of Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon, his enemy and the one 

seeking for his soul.’ (NW) 

As the context shows (verses 1 ff.) these words were uttered not 

long after the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple, when the 

rest of the Jewish population had fled to Egypt after the 

assassination of Gedaliah. At that time Egypt was ruled by Pharaoh 

Hophra, or Apries, as he is named by Herodotus. 111 

If Apries ruled Egypt at the time when the Jews fled there some 

months after the desolation of Jerusalem, this desolation cannot be 

dated to 607 B.C.E., for Apries did not begin his reign until 589 B.C.E. 

(see table above). But a dating of the desolation of Jerusalem to 

587 B.C.E. is in good agreement with the years of reign historically 

established for him: 589–570 B.C.E. 

Fourth synchronism—B.M. 33041: As mentioned earlier, this text 

refers to a campaign against king Amasis ([Ama]-a-su) in 

Nebuchadnezzar’s thirty-seventh year. A. L. Oppenheim’s 

translation of this scanty fragment reads as follows: “. . . [in] the 

37th year, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Bab[ylon], mar[ched against] 

Egypt (Misir) to deliver a battle. [Ama]sis (text: [ . . . ]-a(?)-su), of 

Egypt, [called up his a]rm[y] . . . [ . . . ]ku from the town Putu-laman 

111 His name in the Egyptian inscriptions is transcribed as Wahibre. In the 

Septuagint version of the Old Testament (LXX), his name is spelled Ouaphre.


. . . distant regions which (are situated on islands) amidst the sea 

. . . many . . . which/who (are) in Egypt . . . [car]rying weapons, 

horses and [chariot]s . . . he called up to assist him and . . . did [ . . . 

] in front of him . . . he put his trust . . .. “ 112 

This text is badly damaged, but it does definitely state that the 

campaign into Egypt took place in Nebuchadnezzar’s “thirtyseventh 

year,” and while it is true that the name of the pharaoh is 

only partly legible, the cuneiform signs that are preserved seem 

only to fit Amasis, and no other pharaoh of the twenty-sixth 

dynasty. 

The Watch Tower Society dates the thirty-seventh year of 

Nebuchadnezzar to 588 B.C.E. (Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 1, p. 

698), but this was during the reign of Apries (see the table). On the 

other hand, if Nebuchadnezzar’s thirty-seventh year was 568/67 

BCE., as is established by all the lines of evidence presented earlier, 

this date is in excellent agreement with the reign of Amasis (570– 

526 B.C.E.). 

Consequently, not one of the four synchronisms with the 

independently established chronology of Egypt agrees with the 

chronology developed by the Watch Tower Society. The 

discrepancy in that Society’s reckoning is consistently about twenty 

years out of harmony. 

Interestingly, however, all four synchronisms are in perfect 

harmony with the dates arrived at from the other lines of evidences 

that have been discussed. These synchronisms to the Egyptian 

chronology, therefore, add yet another line of evidence to the others, 

which point consistently to 587 B.C.E. as the definitive date for the 

destruction of Jerusalem. 

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 

Seven lines of evidence have been presented above against any 

possible dating of the destruction of Jerusalem to the year 607 

B.C.E., all of which lines of evidence agree in dating that event 

twenty years later. At least four of these lines of evidence are clearly 

independent of each other. 

Consider first the three which give evidence of interdependence: 

(1) Early historians, the Neo-Babylonian chronicles, and 

the Uruk kinglist 

We first saw that in the third century B.C.E., Babylonian priest 

Berossus wrote a history of Babylonia, quoted from by later 

historians, both in the B.C.E. and early C.E. periods. The validity 

112 Translated by A. Leo Oppenheim in Pritchard’s ANET (see note 2 above), p. 308.


of the dates presented by Berossus in his history is evidenced by 

their accurate reflection of historical material now available on 

ancient cuneiform tablets unearthed in Babylon, particularly the 

Neo-Babylonian Chronicles (a series of historical vignettes setting out 

certain episodes relating to the Babylonian empire, notably records 

of kingly succesion and of military campaigns waged), and also the 

Babylonian kinglists (particularly the one known as the Uruk kinglist) 

which list the Babylonian rulers by name along with the years of 

their reign. 

Likewise with the source known as the Royal Canon, a list of 

Babylonian rulers, which, though only fully extant in manuscripts 

of Ptolemy’s Handy Tables dated to the eighth century C.E. and in 

later manuscripts, seems clearly to have been the common source 

relied upon by astronomer Claudius Ptolemy (70–161 C.E.) and by 

earlier scholars, such as Hipparchus of the second century B.C.E., 

when these dealt with and dated events of the Neo-Babylonian 

period. Though the Royal Canon evidently drew upon sources 

common to those employed by Berossus―that is, the ancient Neo- 

Babylonian chronicles and kinglists―the order and forms of the names 

of kings found in it differ from his presentation sufficiently to 

indicate that it is a record developed independently of his writings. 

It is acknowledged that the Neo-Babylonian chronicles unearthed up 

to this point are still incomplete, and also that some of the figures 

in the Uruk kinglist for the reigns of the Neo-Babylonian kings are 

damaged and only partially legible. However, the figures that are 

there and are legible on these cuneiform tablets all agree with the 

corresponding figures found both in the writings of Berossus and 

in the listing of the Royal Canon. 

There is, then, strong reason to believe that the chronological 

information originally given in those Neo-Babylonian sources has 

been preserved unaltered by Berossus and the Royal Canon. Both 

of these agree as to the overall length of the Neo-Babylonian era. 

In the crucial area here under investigation, their figures point to 

604/03 B.C.E. as the first year of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign, and 

587/86 B.C.E. as his eighteenth year when he desolated Jerusalem. 

Though this evidence is substantial, it remains true that Berossus 

and the Royal Canon are secondary sources, and even those ancient 

tablets known as the Babylonian Chronicles and the Uruk kinglist 

are evidently copies of earlier originals. What supporting evidence 

is there, then, to believe the records involved were actually written 

contemporaneously with the times and events described?


(2) Inscriptions Nabon. No.18 and Nabon. No. 8 (the Hillah 

stele) 

Aside from the Babylonian Chronicles and kinglists there are 

other ancient documents which give evidence of being, not copies, 

but originals. The royal inscription Nabon. No. 18, dated by the aid 

of another inscription known as the Royal Chronicle to the second 

year of Nabonidus, fixes this year astronomically to 554/53 B.C.E. 

As Nabonidus’ reign ended with the fall of Babylon in 539 B.C.E., 

the total length of his reign is shown by this inscription to have 

been seventeen years (555/54–539/38 B.C.E.). 

The whole length of the Neo-Babylonian period prior to Nabonidus is 

given by Nabon. No. 8 (the Hillah stele), which gives the time elapsed 

from the sixteenth year of initial ruler Nabopolassar up to the 

accession-year of final ruler Nabonidus as fifty-four years. The stele 

thus fixes the sixteenth year of Nabopolassar to 610/09 B.C.E. 

If this was Nabopolassar’s sixteenth year, his twenty-first and 

last year was 605/04 B.C.E. Nebuchadnezzar’s first year, then, was 

604/03 B.C.E. and his eighteenth year was 587/86, during which 

Jerusalem was destroyed. 

(3) Nabon. H 1, B (the Adad-guppi’ stele) 

Nabon. H 1, B (the Adad-guppi’ stele) gives the reigns of all the 

Neo-Babylonian kings (except for that of Labashi-Marduk, as his 

brief reign does not affect the chronology presented) from 

Nabopolassar up to the ninth year of Nabonidus. Since the Watch 

Tower Society indirectly accepts a seventeen-year rule for 

Nabonidus (as was shown above in the discussion of the Nabonidus 

Chronicle), this stele of itself overthrows their 607 B.C.E. date for 

the desolation of Jerusalem and shows this event to have taken 

place twenty years later, in 587 B.C.E. 

These three lines of evidence may logically be grouped together 

because it cannot be clearly established that the various documents 

involved are wholly independent of one another. Reasons for 

believing that Berossus and the Royal Canon both got their 

information from Babylonian chronicles and kinglists have already 

been pointed out. It is also possible that the chronological 

information given in the royal inscriptions was derived from the 

chronicles (although this is something that cannot be proved). 113 

Grayson’s suggestion, that the chronicles themselves may have 

113 A. K. Grayson, “Assyria and Babylonia,” Orientalia, Vol. 49 (1980), p. 164


been composed with the help of the information given in the 

astronomical “diaries” has been strongly argued against by other 

scholars. 114 

This possible interdependence of some of these sources, 

however, does not nullify their conclusive power. As the ancient 

royal inscriptions preserve chronological information that is 

contemporary with the Neo-Babylonian era itself, we have every 

reason to accept it as factual and true information. This would be 

true even if this information was based upon contemporary 

Babylonian chronicles. For, although the chronology of these 

chronicles is preserved only in a few fragmentary copies, in a late 

kinglist, and by Berossus and the Royal Canon, the agreement 

between these later sources and the ancient royal inscriptions is 

striking. This agreement confirms that the figures of the original 

Neo-Babylonian chronicles have been correctly preserved in these 

later sources. 

There remain four lines of evidence which have sound claim to 

independence. 

(4) Economic-administrative and legal documents 

Tens of thousands of economic, administrative and legal texts, 

dated to the year, month, and the day of the reigning king, have 

come down to us from the Neo-Babylonian period. A large 

number of dated tablets are extant from each year during this whole 

period. The length of reign of each king may, then, be established 

by these documents, sometimes almost to the day. 

The results arrived at are in good agreement with the figures 

given by Berossus, the Royal Canon, the chronicles, and the 

contemporary royal inscriptions from the reign of Nabonidus. 

The twenty years demanded by the chronology of the Watch 

Tower Society are totally missing. 

The business and administrative documents are original 

documents, contemporary with the Neo-Babylonian era itself, which 

makes this line of evidence exceedingly strong. These documents 

definitely point to 587/86 B.C.E. as Nebuchadnezzar’s eighteenth 

regnal year, when he desolated Jerusalem. 

(5) Prosopographical evidence 

The prosopographical study of the cuneiform tablets provides 

various checks on the accuracy of the Neo-Babylonian chronology. 

114 Ibid.,p. 174. Cf. John M. Steele, Observations and Predictions of Eclipse Times by 

Early Astronomers (Dordrecht, etc: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2000), pp. 127, 

128. The astronomical observations recorded in these diaries must anyway be 

treated as separate and independent lines of evidence.


The careers of scribes, temple administrators, slaves, business 

men, and others may be followed for decades, in some cases 

through almost the whole Neo-Babylonian period and on into the 

Persian era. Thousands of dated documents give insight into the 

business, legal, religious, family and other activities of these 

individuals. Many texts deal with matters that extend over weeks, 

months, or even years, such as inventories, lease of land or houses, 

instalments of debts, hire of slaves and livestock, run-away slaves, 

court proceedings, and so on. 

The activities of some individuals may be followed through 

almost their whole lives. But never do we find that their activities 

cross the established chronological borders of the period into some 

unknown twenty-year period that the Watch Tower Society would 

add to the Neo-Babylonian era. The insertion of these twenty years 

would, in fact, not only distort the understanding of the careers, 

activities, and family relations of many individuals, but it would 

also give many of them abnormal life spans. 

(6) Chronological interlocking joints 

Sometimes a text may contain activities and dates that intersect 

two or more consecutive reigns in a way that chronologically ties 

them together and excludes every possibility of inserting extra 

kings and years between them. 

As was demonstrated in this particular section, quite a number 

of such documents exist that interlock each reign with the next 

throughout the whole Neo-Babylonian period. Although eleven documents 

of this kind were presented earlier, a close examination of the tens 

of thousands of unpublished tablets from the Neo-Babylonian 

period would probably multiply the number. Those presented, 

however, suffice to show that the length of the whole Neo- 

Babylonian era may be securely established by the aid of such 

“chronological joints” alone. 

(7) Synchronisms with the contemporary Egyptian 

chronology 

The chronology of contemporary Egyptian kings provides an 

excellent test of Neo-Babylonian chronology, as there are four 

synchronisms tied to it, three of which are given in the Bible. 

These synchronisms are of the utmost importance, as the 

contemporary chronology of Egypt has been established 

independently of the chronologies of other nations of that time. Yet it 

was shown that the Egyptian chronology is in complete harmony 

with the data given by Berossus, the Royal Canon, and all the


cuneiform documents discussed above, while a comparison with 

the chronology of the Watch Tower Society shows a consistent 

difference of about twenty years. 

These four synchronisms to Egyptian chronology all refute the 

607 B.C.E. date for the desolation of Jerusalem and once again 

uphold 587/86 B.C.E. as the correct date for that event. 

The evidence from all this material is overwhelming and should 

certainly be considered conclusive. For most scholars, just two or three 

of these seven lines of evidence would be sufficient proof of the 

accuracy of the Neo-Babylonian chronology. For the leaders of the 

Watch Tower Society, however, not even seven lines of evidence are 

enough to change their minds, as shown by their consistent 

rejection of such evidence presented to them earlier. 

Since the chronology constitutes the very foundation for the 

major claims and message of the organization, they evidently feel 

that too much is at stake for abandoning their Gentile times 

chronology, not least of this being their own claimed position of 

divine authority. It is extremely unlikely, therefore, that even twice 

the number of lines of evidence will have any influence on their 

minds. 

For the sake of completeness, however, another seven lines of 

evidence will be presented in detail in the next chapter, and a few 

others wil1 be briefly described. As all of them are based on 

ancient Babylonian astronomical texts, they will be shown to turn the 

chronology of the whole Neo-Babylonian era into what is termed 

an absolute chronology.

4 

THE ABSOLUTE CHRONOLOGY 

OF 

THE NEO-BABYLONIAN ERA 

A 

S EXPLAINED earlier in chapter 2, an absolute chronology is 

usually best established by the aid of ancient astronomical 

observations. 

Although no observations usable for dating purposes are 

recorded in the Bible, it was pointed out that at 2 Kings 25:2, 8 the 

dating of the desolation of Jerusalem to “the eleventh year of King 

Zedekiah,” the last king of Judah, is synchronized with “the 

nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar,” the Babylonian desolator of 

the city. If the reign of Nebuchadnezzar could be fixed 

astronomically to our era, it would be possible to establish the 

B.C.E. date for the desolation of Jerusalem. 

In this chapter it will be demonstrated that the whole Neo- 

Babylonian period, including the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, may be 

established as an absolute chronology by the aid of astronomical 

cuneiform documents found in Mesopotamia. 

The study of the Babylonian astronomical documents 

The study of the astronomical cuneiform texts started more than 

one hundred years ago. One of the leading Assyriologists at that 

time was J. N. Strassmaier (1846–1920). He was a diligent copyist 

of the cuneiform texts that from the 1870’s onwards were being 

brought from Mesopotamia to the British Museum in enormous 

quantities. 

Strassmaier found that a great number of the texts contained 

astronomical data. He sent copies of these texts to his colleague J. 

Epping, who taught mathematics and astronomy in Falkenburg, 

Holland. Thus Epping (1835–1894) was to become the pioneer in 

153


the study of the Babylonian astronomical texts. After his death 

another of Strassmaier’s colleagues, Franz Xaver Kugler (1862– 

1929), took over the work of Epping. 

Few, if any, have contributed as much to the study of the 

astronomical texts as Kugler. He published his results in a series of 

monumental works, such as Die Babylonische Mondrechnung (1901), 

Sternkunde and Sterndienst in Babel, Vol. I and II (1907–1924), and 

Von Moses bis Paulus (1922). The last two works include detailed 

studies of ancient chronology, in which the astronomical texts are 

fully developed and studied in depth. 1 

After Kugler’s death in 1929 some of the key names in the study 

of the Babylonian astronomy have been P. J. Schaumberger 

(deceased 1955), Otto Neugebauer (1899–1990), and Abraham J. 

Sachs (1914–1983). Many other modern scholars have contributed 

much to the understanding of the astronomical texts, some of 

whom have been consulted for the following discussion. 

Ancient astronomy 

As can be deduced from the Babylonian astronomical tablets, a 

regular and systematic study of the sky began in the mid-eighth 

century B.C.E., perhaps even earlier. Trained observers were 

specifically employed to carry out a regular watch of the positions 

and movements of the sun, the moon and the planets, and to 

record from day to day the phenomena observed. 

This regular activity was performed at a number of 

observational sites in Mesopotamia, located in the cities of 

Babylon, Uruk, Nippur, Sippar, Borsippa, Cutha, and Dilbat. 2 (See 

the accompanying map.) 

As a result of this activity, the Babylonian scholars at an early 

stage had recognized the various cycles of the sun, the moon and 

the five planets visible to the naked eye (Mercury, Venus, Mars, 

Jupiter, and Saturn), enabling them even to predict certain 

phenomena, such as lunar eclipses. 

1 Kugler’s results are of lasting value. Dr. Schaumberger states that Kugler “on all 

essential points has fixed the chronology for the last centuries before Christ, 

having thus performed an invaluable service to the science of history.”—P. J. 

Schaumberger, “Drei babylonische Planetentafeln der Seleukidenzeit,” Orientalia, 

Vol. 2, Nova Series (Rome, 1933), p. 99. 

2 In Assyrian times, such observations were also performed in the cities of Assur 

and Nineveh. The observations in Babylonia were possibly performed on top of 

temple-towers, ziggurats, such as the ziggurat of Etemenanki in Babylon.

The Absolute Chronology of the Neo-Babylonian Era 155 

Astronomical Observation Sites in Babylonia 

Finally, in the Persian and Seleucid eras, they had developed a 

very high level of scientific and mathematical astronomy that had 

never been reached by any other ancient civilization. 3 

The nature of the Babylonian astronomical texts* 

Although astronomical cuneiform texts have been found also in 

the ruins of Nineveh and Uruk, the bulk of the texts—about 

1,600—comes from an astronomical archive somewhere in the city 

of Babylon. 

3 It has often been pointed out that the Babylonian interest in the sky to a great 

extent was astrologically motivated. Although this is correct, Professor Otto 

Neugebauer points out that the main purpose of the Babylonian astronomers was 

not astrology, but the study of calendaric problems. (Otto Neugebauer, Astronomy 

and History. Selected Essays. New York: Springer-Verlag, 1983, p. 55.) For further 

comments on the astrological motive, see the Appendix for chapter four, section 1: 

“Astrology as a motive for Babylonian astronomy.” 

* Consideration of astronomical evidence inescapably involves much technical data. 

Some readers may prefer to bypass this and go to the summary at the end of this 

chapter. The technical data is nonetheless there for corroboration.


The archive was found and emptied by local inhabitants from 

nearby villages, and the exact finding spot within the city is not 

known today. Most of the texts were obtained for the British 

Museum from dealers in the latter part of the nineteenth century. 

About 300 of the texts are concerned with scientific 

mathematical astronomy and belong to the last four centuries 

B.C.E. Most of them are ephemerides, that is, tables with calculations 

of the positions of the moon and the five naked-eye planets. 

The greater part of the remaining texts, however, about 1,300 in 

number, are non-mathematical and principally observational in 

nature. The observations date from about 750 B.C.E. to the first 

century of the Christian era. 4 The great number of observational 

texts are of the utmost importance for establishing the absolute 

chronology of this whole period. 

With respect to content, the non-mathematical texts may be 

subdivided into various categories. By far the largest group are the 

so-called astronomical “diaries. “ These record on a regular basis a 

large number of phenomena, including the positions of the moon 

and the planets. It is generally accepted that such “diaries” were 

kept continuously from the mid-eighth century B.C.E. onwards. 

The other categories of texts, which include almanacs (each 

recording astronomical data for one particular Babylonian year), 

texts with planetary observations (each giving data for one specific 

planet), and texts recording lunar eclipses, were apparently excerpts 

from the “diaries.” 

Thus, although only a handful of diaries from the four earliest 

centuries are extant, quite a number of the observations recorded 

in other diaries compiled in this early period have been preserved 

in these excerpts. 

A comprehensive examination of all the non-mathematical texts 

was started several decades ago by Dr. A. J. Sachs, who devoted the 

last thirty years of his life to the study of these texts. 5 After his 

death in 1983, Sachs’ work has been continued by Professor 

Hermann Hunger (in Vienna, Austria), who today is the leading 

expert on the astronomical observational texts. Both of these 

authorities were consulted for the following discussion. 

4 Asger Aaboe, ‘Babylonian Mathematics, Astrology, and Astronomy,” The Cambridge 

Ancient History, Vol. III:2 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), pp. 277– 

78. The observational texts may also occasionally contain descriptions of eclipses 

calculated in advance. 

5 The various kinds of texts were classified by A. J. Sachs in the Journal of 

Cuneiform Studies, Vol. 2 (1948), pp. 271–90. In the work Late Babylonian 

Astronomical and Related Texts (Providence, Rhode Island: Brown University Press, 

1955), Sachs presents an extensive catalogue of the astronomical, astrological, and 

mathematical cuneiform texts, most of which had been copied by T. G. Pinches 

and J. N. Strassmaier in the late nineteenth century. The catalogue lists 1520 

astronomical texts, but many more have been discovered since.


A. THE ASTRONOMICAL DIARIES 

A “diary” usually covers the six or seven months of the first or 

second half of a particular Babylonian year and records, often on a 

day-to-day basis, the positions of the moon and the planets in 

relation to certain stars and constellations, and also gives details of 

lunar and solar eclipses. Much additional information is added, 

such as meteorological events, earthquakes, market prices, and 

similar data. Sometimes also historical events are recorded. 6 Over 

2,000 years old, it is only to be expected that these clay tablets are 

often fragmentary. 

More than 1,200 fragments of astronomical diaries of various 

sizes have been discovered, but because of their fragmentary 

condition only about a third of the number are datable. 

Most of these cover the period from 385 to 61 B.C.E. and 

contain astronomical information from about 180 of these years, 

thus firmly establishing the chronology of this period. 7 

Half a dozen of the diaries are earlier. The two oldest are VAT 

4956 from the sixth and BM. 32312 from the seventh centuries 

B.C.E. Both provide absolute dates that firmly establish the length 

of the Neo-Babylonian period. 

A-l: The astronomical diary VAT 4956 

The most important astronomical diary for our discussion is 

designated VAT 4956 and is kept in the Near Eastern department 

(”Vorderasiatischen Abteilung”) in the Berlin Museum. This diary 

is dated from Nisanu 1 of Nebuchadnezzar’s thirty-seventh regnal 

year to Nisanu 1 of his thirty-eighth regnal year, recording 

observations from five months of his thirty-seventh year (months 

1, 2, 3, 11 and 12). The most recent transcription and translation of 

the text is that of Sachs and Hunger, published in 1988. 8 

6 The scribes evidently kept running records of their day-to-day observations, as 

may be seen from smaller tablets that cover much shorter periods, sometimes only 

a few days. From these records the longer diaries were compiled.—A. J. Sachs & H. 

Hunger, Astronomical Diaries and Related Texts from Babylonia, Vol. I (Wien: Verlag 

der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1988), p. 12. 

7 Otto Neugebauer, for example, explains: “Since planetary and lunar data of such 

variety and abundance define the date of a text with absolute accuracy—lunar 

positions with respect to fixed stars do not even allow 24 hours of uncertainty 

which is otherwise involved in lunar dates—we have here records of Seleucid 

history [312–64 B .C.E.] which are far more reliable than any other historical 

source material at our disposal.”—Orientalistische Literaturzeitung, Vol. 52 (1957), 

p. 133. 

8 Sachs—Hunger, op.cit. (1988), pp. 46–53. The first translation of the text, which 

also includes an extensive commentary, is that of P. V. Neugebauer and Ernst F. 

Weidner, “Ein astronomischer Beobachtungstext aus dem 37. Jahre 

Nebukadnezars II. (–567/66),” in Berichte über die Verhandlungen der Königl. 

Sachsischen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Leipzig: Philologisch-Historische 

Klasse, Band 67:2, 1915, pp. 29–89.


The extant datable astronomical diaries 

The earliest diary is from 652/51 B.C.E. Then follows VAT 4956 

from 568/67 B.C.E. Most cover the period from 385 to 61 

B.C.E., containing astronomical information from about 180 of 

these years. — The chart is reproduced from A. J. Sachs, 

"Babylonian observational astronomy," in F. R Hodson (ed.), The 

Place of Astronomy in the Ancient World (London: Oxford University 

Press, 1974), p. 47. 

Among the many observed positions recorded on VAT 4956, 

there are about thirty which are so exactly described that modern 

astronomers can easily fix the precise dates when they were seen. 

By doing so they have been able to show that all these observations 

(of the moon and the five then known planets) must have been 

made during the year 568/67 B.C.E. 

If Nebuchadnezzar’s thirty-seventh regnal year was 568/67 

B.C.E., then it follows that his first year must have been 604/03 

B..C.E., and his eighteenth year, during which he desolated


Jerusalem, 587/86 B.C.E. 9 This is the same date indicated by all the 

seven lines of evidence discussed in the previous chapter! 

Could all these observations also have been made twenty years 

earlier, in the year 588/87 B.C.E., which according to the 

chronology of the Watch Tower Society’s Bible dictionary Insight on 

the Scriptures corresponded to Nebuchadnezzar’s thirty-seventh 

regnal year? 10 The same dictionary (page 456 of Vol. 1, where VAT 

4956 is obviously alluded to) acknowledges that “Modern 

chronologers point out that such a combination of astronomical 

positions would not be duplicated again in thousands of years.” 

Let us consider one example. According to this diary, on Nisanu 

1 of Nebuchadnezzar’s thirty-seventh year the planet Saturn could 

be observed “in front of the Swallow,” the “Swallow” (SIM) 

referring to the south-west part of the constellation of the Fishes 

(Pisces) of the Zodiac. 11 As Saturn has a revolution of c. 29.5 years, 

it moves through the whole Zodiac in 29.5 years. This means that it 

can be observed in each of the twelve constellations of the Zodiac 

for about 2.5 years on the average. It means also that Saturn could 

be seen “in front of the Swallow” 29.5 years previous to 568/67 

B.C.E., that is, in 597/96 B.C.E, but certainly not 20 years earlier, in 

588/87 B.C.E., the date the Watch Tower would like to assign for 

Nebuchadnezzar’s thirty-seventh regnal year. That is simply an 

astronomical impossibility, even in the case of this one planet. But 

there are five planets that figure in the diary’s astronomical 

observations. 

Add, therefore, the different revolutions of the other four planets, 

the positions of which are specified several times in the text, along 

with the positions given for the moon at various times of the year, 

and it becomes easily understood why such a combination of 

observations could not be made again in thousands of years. The 

observations recorded in VAT 4956 must have been made in the 

year 568/67 B.C.E., because they fit no other situation which 

occurred either thousands of years before or after that date! 

9 The diary clearly states that the observations were made during Nebuchadnezzar’s 

thirty-seventh year. The text opens with the words: “Year 37 of Nebukadnezar, 

king of Babylon.” The latest date, given close to the end of the text, is: “Year 38 of 

Nebukadnezar, month I, the 1st.”—Sachs–Hunger, op. cit., pp. 47, 53. 

10 Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 2 (Brooklyn, New York: Watchtower Bible and Tract 

Society, 1988), p. 481, under the subheading “Takes Tyre.” 

11 Sachs-Hunger, op. cit., pp. 46–49. The expression “in front of” in the text refers to 

the daily westward rotation of the celestial sphere and means “to the west of”. 

(Ibid., p.22) For a discussion of the Babylonian names of the constellations, see 

Bartel L. van der Waerden, Science Awakening, Vol.II (New York: Oxford University 

Press, 1974), pp. 71–74, 97.


VAT 4956, now in the ”Vorderasiatisches Abteilung” in the 

Berlin Museum, gives detail on about 30 positions of the moon 

and the five then known planets for the 37th year of 

Nebuchadnezzar (568/67 B.C.E.), establishing that year as the most 

reliable absolute date in the sixth century B.C.E.—Reproduced from A. 

J. Sacks & H. Hunger, Astronomical Diaries and Related Texts from 

Babylonia, Vol. I (Wien: Verlag der österreichischen Akademie der 

Wissenschaften, 1988), Plate 3. Photo used courtesy of the 

Vorderasiatisches Museum in Berlin.


Thus VAT 4956 gives very strong support to the chronology of 

the Neo-Babylonian era as established by the historians. 

Attempting to overcome this evidence, the Watch Tower Society, 

in the above-mentioned Bible dictionary, goes on to state that, 

“While to some this might seem like incontrovertible evidence, 

there are factors greatly reducing its strength.” 

What are these factors? And do they genuinely reduce the 

strength of the evidence in this ancient tablet? 

(a) The first is that the observations made in Babylon may have 

contained errors. The Babylonian astronomers showed greatest 

concern for celestial events or phenomena occurring close to the 

horizon, at the rising or setting of the moon or the sun. However, 

the horizon as viewed from Babylon is frequently obscured by 

sandstorms. 

Then Professor Otto Neugebauer is quoted as saying that 

Ptolemy complained about “the lack of reliable planetary 

observations [from. ancient Babylon] .” 12 

However, many of the observations recorded in the diaries were 

not made close to the horizon, but higher up in the sky. Further, 

Babylonian astronomers had several means of overcoming 

unfavorable weather conditions. 

As noted earlier, the observations were performed at a number of 

sites in Mesopotamia. What could not be observed at one place due 

to clouds or sandstorms, could probably be observed somewhere 

else. 13 

One method used to get over the difficulty of observing stars 

close to the horizon due to dust was to observe, instead, “the 

simultaneously occurring of other stars, the so-called ziqpu-stars,” 

that is, stars crossing the meridian higher up on the sky at their 

culmination. 14 

Finally, the horizon as viewed from Babylon was not obscured 

by sandstorms every day, and some planetary events could be 

observed many days or weeks in succession, also higher up in the 

sky, for example, the position of Saturn which, according to our 

text, could be observed “in front of the Swallow [the south-west 

part of the Fishes].” As was pointed out above, Saturn can be 

observed in each of the twelve constellations of the Zodiac for 

about 2.5 years on the average. 

12 Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 1, p. 456. 

13 See the comments by Hermann Hunger (ed.) in Astrological Reports to Assyrian 

Kings (Helsinki: Helsinki University Press, 1992), p. XXII. 

14 B. L. van der Waerden, op. cit., pp. 77, 78. ziqpu is the Babylonian technical term 

for culmination. The procedure is explained in the famous Babylonian 

astronomical compendium MUL.APIN from about the seventh century B.C.E. (van 

der Waerden, ibid.)


Saturn’s position in the vicinity of the southern Fish, then, could 

have been observed for several months in succession, which would 

have made it impossible for Babylonian astronomers in their 

regular observations of the planets to make any mistake as to where 

this planet could be seen during the thirty-seventh year of 

Nebuchadnezzar, in spite of frequent sandstorms. Our text, in fact, 

directly states that Saturn was observed “in front of the Swallow” 

not only on the first day of Nisanu (the first month), but also on 

the first day of Ayyaru (the second month)! 

That the observations recorded in VAT 4956 are substantially 

correct may be seen from the fact that all of them (except for one 

or two containing scribal errors) fit the same year. This would not 

have been the case if the observations were erroneous. 15 

The next factor brought up in the Watch Tower Society’s Bible 

dictionary that is held to reduce the strength of VAT 4956 is the 

fact that some diaries are not original documents but later copies: 

(b) Second, the fact is that the great majority of the 

astronomical diaries found were written, not in the time of the 

Neo-Babylonian or Persian empires, but in the Seleucid period 

(312–65 B.C.E.), although they contain data relating to those 

earlier periods. Historians assume that they are copies of earlier 

documents. 

There is nothing to show that most diaries are later copies, but 

some are, as indicated by writing conventions used in the text. The 

earliest dated diaries frequently reflect the struggle of the copyists 

to understand the ancient documents they were copying, some of 

which were broken or otherwise damaged, and often the 

documents used an archaic terminology which the copyists tried to 

“modernize.” This is clearly true of VAT 4956, too. Twice in the 

text the copyist added the comment “broken off,” indicating he 

was unable to decipher a word in the copy. Also, the text reflects 

15 Some events recorded in the diaries are actually not observations, but events 

calculated in advance. Thus VAT 4956 records an eclipse of the moon which 

occurred on the 15th day of the month Simanu (the third month). That this eclipse 

had been calculated in advance is evident from the expression AN-KU10 sin (also 

transcribed atalû Sin), which denotes a predicted lunar eclipse. It is further pointed 

out in the text that the eclipse “was omitted” (literally, “passed by”), that is, it was 

invisible in Babylon. (Sachs-Hunger, op. cit., Vol. I, 1988, pp. 23, 48, 49) This does 

not mean that the prediction failed. The expression implied that the eclipse was 

expected not to be seen. According to modern calculations, the eclipse took place 

on July 4,568 B.C.E. (Julian calendar), but as it took place in the afternoon it was 

not visible at Babylon. The method that may have been used by the Babylonian 

astronomers for predicting this eclipse is discussed by Professor Peter Huber in B. 

L. van der Waerden (op. cit., note 11 above), pp. 117–120.


his attempt to change the archaic terminology. But did he also 

change the content of the text? 

On this the first translators of the text, P. V. Neugebauer and E. 

F. Weidner, concluded: “As far as the contents are concerned the 

copy is of course a faithful reproduction of the original.” 16 Other 

scholars, who since have examined the document, agree. Professor 

Peter Huber states: 

It is preserved only in a copy of much later date, but that 

appears to be a faithful transcript (orthographically somewhat 

modernized) of an original of NEBUCHADNEZZAR’S time. 17 

Suppose that some of the material in the about thirty 

completely received observations recorded in VAT 4956 had been 

distorted by later copyists. How great is the possibility that all these 

“distorted” observations would fit into one and the same year—the 

very one corroborated by Berossus, the Royal Canon, the 

chronicles, the royal inscriptions, the contract tablets, the Uruk 

kinglist, and many other documents—that is, Nebuchadnezzar’s 

thirty-seventh regnal year? Accidental errors of this kind do not 

“cooperate” to such a great extent. So there is no sound reason to 

doubt that the original observations have been correctly preserved 

in our copy. 

(c) Finally, as in the case of Ptolemy, even though the 

astronomical information (as now interpreted and understood) on 

the texts discovered is basically accurate, this does not prove that 

the historical information accompanying it is accurate. Even as 

Ptolemy used the reigns of ancient kings (as he understood them) 

simply as a framework in which to place his astronomical data, so 

too, the writers (or copyists) of the astronomical texts of the 

Seleucid period may have simply inserted in their astronomical 

texts what was then the accepted, or “popular,” chronology of that 

time! 18 

What is suggested by the Watch Tower organization is that the 

later copyists changed the dates found in the “diaries” in order to 

adapt them to their own concepts of the ancient Babylonian and 

Persian chronology. Thus a writer in the Awake! magazine imagines 

that “the copyist of ‘VAT 4956’ may, in line with the chronology 

16 P. V. Neugebauer and E. F. Weidner, op. cit. (see note 8), p. 39. 

17 Peter Huber in B . L. van der Waerden, ap. cit., p. 96. 

18 Insight an the Scriptures, Vol. 1, p. 456. As pointed out in chapter 3 above (section 

A2), the so-called “Ptolemy’s Canon” (or, Royal Canon) was not worked out by 

Claudius Ptolemy. Further, as his quotations from ancient Babylonian 

astronomical texts available to him show that these were already dated to specific 

regnal years of ancient kings, he cannot have used the canon “as a framework in 

which to place his astronomical data.”


accepted in his time, have inserted the ‘thirty-seventh year of 

Nebuchadnezzar’ .” 19 Is this a plausible theory? 

As was pointed out above, VAT 4956 is dated from Nisanu 1 of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s thirty-seventh year to Nisanu 1 of his thirtyeighth 

year. Further, almost all events mentioned in the text are 

dated, with the month, the day and—when necessary—the time of the 

day given. About forty dates of this kind are given in the text, though 

the year, of course, is not repeated at all these places. All known 

diaries are dated in a similar way. 

In order to change the years in the text, the copyists would also 

have been forced to change the name of the reigning king. Why? 

Nebuchadnezzar died in his forty-third year of rule. If his thirtyseventh 

year fell in 588/87 B.C.E., as the Watch Tower Society 

holds, he must have been dead for many years by 568/67 B.C.E. 

when the observations of VAT 4956 were made. 

Is it really likely that the Seleucid copyists devoted themselves to 

such large-scale forgeries? What do we know about the “popular” 

chronology of their time, which is proposed in the Watch Tower’s 

publication as the motive for this deliberate fraud? 

The chronology for the Neo-Babylonian era composed by 

Berossus early in the Seleucid period evidently represents the 

contemporary, “popular” concept of Neo-Babylonian 

chronology. 20 If counted backwards from the fall of Babylon in 539 

B.C.E., Berossus’ figures for the reigns of Neo-Babylonian kings 

place Nebuchadnezzar’s thirty-seventh year in 568/67 B.C.E. as 

does VAT 4956. 

More importantly, Berossus’ Neo-Babylonian chronology, as 

shown earlier in chapter three, is of the same length as that given by the 

many documents contemporary with the Neo-Babylonian era itself such as 

chronicles, royal inscriptions, business documents, as well as with 

contemporary Egyptian documents! 

The “popular” Neo-Babylonian chronology as presented in the 

Seleucid era, then, was not something based on mere supposition, 

but meets the qualifications of a true and correct chronology, and 

there was no need for copyists to alter the ancient documents in 

order to adapt them to it. The theory that they falsified these 

documents, therefore, is groundless. Besides, it is refuted 

completely by other astronomical texts, including the next diary to 

be discussed. 

19 Awake!, May 8, 1972, page 28. 

20 As explained in chapter 3 above (section A-1), Berossus’ chronology was composed 

about 281 B.C.E. The Seleucid era began in 312 B.C.E.


The astronomical diary B.M. 32312 

This diary gives details on the positions of Mercury, Saturn, and Mars, 

which date it to the year 652/51 B.C.E. An historical notice, also 

repeated in the Akitu Chronicle and there dated to the 16th year of 

Shamashshumukin, fixes that year to 652/51 B.C.E., which 

prevents any extension of the Neo-Babylonian era backwards in 

time. Photo used courtesy of the Trustees of the British Museum. 

A-2: The astronomical diary BM. 32312 

In an article published in 1974, Professor Abraham J. Sachs gives a 

brief presentation of the astronomical diaries. Mentioning that the 

oldest datable diary contains observations from the year 652 

B.C.E., he explains how he was able to fix its date: 

When I first tried to date this text, I found the astronomical 

contents to be just barely adequate to make this date virtually 

certain.


It was a great relief when I was able to confirm the date by 

matching up a historical remark in the diary with the 

corresponding statement for –651 in a well-dated historical 

chronicle. 21 

As this diary seemed to be of great importance for the question 

of Babylonian chronology, I wrote to Professor Sachs back in 1980 

and asked two questions: 

1. What information in the diary makes the date –651 [=652 

B.C.E.], “virtually certain”? 

2. What kind of historical remark in the diary corresponds with 

what statement in which well-dated chronicle? 

In his answer Professor Sachs enclosed a copy of a photograph 

of the diary in question, B.M. 32312, and added information which 

fully answered my two questions. The astronomical contents of the 

diary clearly establish the year as 652/51 B.C.E. when the 

observations were made. Sachs writes that “the preserved 

astronomical events (Mercury’s last visibility in the east behind 

Pisces, Saturn’s last visibility behind Pisces, both around the 14th 

of month I; Mars’ stationary point in Scorpio on the 17th of month 

I; Mercury’s first visibility in Pisces on the 6th of month XII) 

uniquely determine the date.” 22 

Interestingly, it cannot be claimed that this diary was redated by 

later copyists, because the name of the king, his regnal year, and 

month names are broken away. Yet these data may justifiably be 

supplied because of a historical remark at the end of the diary. For 

“the 27th” of the month (the month name is broken away) the 

diary states that at the site of “Hiritu in the province of Sippar the 

troops of Babylonia and of Assyria fou[ght with each] other, and 

21 A. J. Sachs, ‘Babylonian observational astronomy,” in F. R. Hodson (ed.), The Place 

of Astronomy in the Ancient World (Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of 

London, ser. A. 276, London: Oxford University Press, 1974), p.48. — For the 

purpose of facilitating astronomical computations, the year preceding 1 C.E. is 

called 0 instead of 1 B.C.E. and the year preceding 0 is called -1 instead of 2 

B.C.E. The year 652 B.C.E., therefore, is astronomically written as —651. 

22 Letter Sachs-Jonsson, dated February 10, 1980. The diary has since been 

published in Sachs-Hunger, op. cit., Vol. I (1988; see note 6 above), pp. 42–47. Of 

the first two events, the scribe says: “I did not watch because the days were 

overcast “ (Ibid., p. 43) This statement does not make the astronomically fixed date 

of the positions less certain. As pointed out earlier, the Babylonian scholars not 

only knew the various cycles of the visible planets , but they also regularly 

watched their daily motions and positions relative to certain fixed stars or 

constellations along the ecliptic. Thus, even if a planet could not be observed for 

some days due to clouds, its position could easily be deduced from its position 

when it was last seen.


the troops of Babylonia withdrew and were heavily defeated.” 23 

Fortunately, it is possible to place the time of this battle since it is 

also mentioned in a well-known Babylonian chronicle. 

The chronicle is the so-called Akitu Chronicle, B.M. 86379, which 

covers a part of Shamashshumukin’s reign, especially his last five 

years (the sixteenth to the twentieth). The battle at Hiritu is dated 

in his sixteenth year as follows: 

The sixteenth year of Shamash-shuma-ukin: . . . On the twentyseventh 

day of Adar [the 12th month] the armies of Assyria and 

Akkad [Babylonia] did battle in Hirit. The army of Akkad retreated 

from the battlefield and a major defeat was inflicted upon them. 24 

The astronomical events described in the diary fix the battle at 

Hiritu on Adam 27 to 651 B.C.E. 25 The Akitu Chronicle shows 

that this battle at this place on this day was fought in the sixteenth 

year of Shamashshumukin. Thus Shamashshumukin’s sixteenth 

year was 652/51 B.C.E. His entire reign of twenty years, then, may 

be dated to 667/66 – 648/47 B.C.E. 

Now this is the way historians have dated Shamashshumukin’s 

reign for a long time, and that is why Professor Sachs concluded 

his letter by saying: “I should perhaps add that the absolute 

chronology of the regnal years of Shamash-shuma-ukin was never 

in doubt, and it is only confirmed again by the astronomical diary.” 

Shamashshumukin’s reign has been known, for example, 

through the Royal Canon which gives him twenty years and his 

successor Kandalanu twenty-two years. Thereafter Nabopolassar, 

Nebuchadnezzar’s father, succeeded to the throne. 26 These figures 

are in good agreement with the ancient cuneiform sources. 

Business documents, as well as the Akitu Chronicle, show that 

Shamashshumukin ruled for twenty years. Business documents, 

supported by the Uruk King List, also show that from the first year 

23 Sachs-Hunger, op. cit., p. 45. For a discussion of this battle, see Grant Frame, 

Babylonia 689–627 B.C. (Leiden: Nederlands Historisch-Archaeologisch Institut to 

Istanbul, 1992), pp. 144–45, 289–92. 

24 A. K. Grayson, Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles (Locust Valley, New York: J. J. 

Augustin Publisher, 1975), pp. 131–32. 

25 As the first month, Nisanu, began in March or April, 652 B.C.E., Adaru, the twelfth 

month, began in February or March, 651 B.C.E. 

26 That Kandalanu was succeeded by Nabopolassar is directly stated in the Akitu 

Chronicle: “After Kandalanu, in the accession year of Nabopolassar”— Grayson, op. 

cit., p. 132.


of Kandalanu to the first year of Nabopolassar was a period of 

twenty-two years. Thus the chronology of that era, supplied by 

these sources, is as follows: 

Shamashshumukin 20 years 667 – 648 B.C.E. 

Kandalanu 22 years 647 – 626 B.C.E. 

Nabopolassar 21 years 625 – 605 B.C.E. 

Nebuchadnezzar 43 years 604 – 562 B.C.E. 

The diary B.M. 32312, although establishing a date prior to the 

Neo-Babylonian period (which began with Nabopolassar), again 

coincides with and helps corroborate the chronology of that era. 

This diary, then, adds yet another witness to the increasing 

amount of evidence against the 607 B.C.E. date. A change of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s eighteenth year from 587 to 607 B .C.E. would 

also change Shamashshumukin’s sixteenth year from 652 to 672 

B.C.E. But the diary B.M. 32312 rules out such a change. 

And, as already pointed out, no one can claim that later copyists 

inserted “the 16th year of Shamashshumukin” in this diary, because 

the text is damaged at this point and that datum is broken away! It 

is the unique historical information in the text, information 

repeated in the Akitu Chronicle, that fixes the diary to 

Shamashshumukin’s sixteenth year. 

This diary, therefore, may be regarded as an independent witness 

which upholds the authenticity of the dates given in VAT 4956 and 

other diaries. 27 

27 A catalogue of business documents compiled by J. A. Brinkman and D. A. Kennedy 

that includes the reigns of Shamashshumukin and Kandalanu is published in the 

Journal of Cuneiform Studies (JCS), Vol. 35, 1983, pp. 25–52. (Cf. also JCS 36, 

1984, pp. 1–6, and the table of G. Frame, op. cit., pp. 263–68.) Cuneiform texts 

show that Kandalanu evidently died in his twenty-first regnal year, after which 

several pretenders to the throne fought for power, until Nabopolassar succeeded in 

ascending to the throne. Some business documents span the period of 

interregnum by artificially carrying on Kandalanu’s reign after his death, the last 

one (B.M. 40039) being dated to his “22nd year” (”the second day of Arahsamnu 

[the 8th month] of the 22nd year after Kandalanu”). This method is also used by 

the Royal Canon, which gives Kandalanu a reign of twenty-two years. Other 

documents span the period differently. The Uruk King List gives Kandalanu 

twenty-one years, and gives the year of interregnum to two of the combatants, Sinshum-lishir 

and Sin-shar-ishkun. See chapter three above, section B-1-b.) The 

Babylonian chronicle B.M. 25127 states of the same year: “For one year there was 

no king in the land” (Grayson, op. cit., p. 88) All documents agree, however, to the 

total length of the period from Shamashshumukin to Nabopolassar. (For additional 

details on Kandalanu’s reign, see the discussion by G. Frame, op. cit., pp. 191–96, 

209–13, 284–88.)


B. THE SATURN TABLET (BM. 76738 + BM. 76813) 

One of the most important astronomical texts from the seventh 

century B.C.E. is the Saturn tablet from the reign of the Babylonian 

king Kandalanu (647–626 B.C.E.), predecessor of Nabopolassar, 

Nebuchadnezzar’s father. 

This text consists of two broken pieces, B.M. 76738 and B.M. 

76813. 28 The text was first described by C. B. F. Walker in 1983 in 

the Bulletin of the Society for Mesopotamian Studies. 29 A transcription and 

a translation with a full discussion of the text by Mr. C.B.F. Walker 

has recently been published. 30 

As explained earlier (section A-1 above), the planet Saturn has a 

revolution of c. 29.5 years. Due to the revolution of the earth 

round the sun, Saturn disappears behind the sun for a few weeks 

and reappears again at regular intervals of 378 days. 

The Saturn tablet gives the dates (regnal year, month, and day in 

the Babylonian calendar) and the positions of the planet Saturn at 

its first and last appearances for a period of fourteen successive 

years, specifically, the first fourteen years of Kandalanu (647–634 

B.C.E.). The name of the king, given only in the first line, is 

partially damaged, but may be restored as [Kand]alanu. The name of 

the planet is nowhere mentioned in the text, but the observations 

fit Saturn and no other planet. 

As Mr. Walker explains: 

The name of the planet Saturn is not given on the tablet, and 

the name of Kandalanu is to be restored from only a few traces in 

the first line. It is, however, certain that we are dealing with Saturn 

and Kandalanu. Saturn is the slowest moving of the visible planets, 

and only Saturn would move the distances indicated between 

successive first visibilities. 31 

The text is damaged in several places, and many of the year 

numbers are illegible. Years 2, 3, 6, 7, 8, and 13 are undamaged, 

however. 

28 Listed as AH 83-1-18, 2109+2185 in E. Leichty et al, Catalogue of the Babylonian 

Tablets in the British Museum. VIII (London: British Museum Publications Ltd, 

1988), p. 70. 

29 C. B. F. Walker, “Episodes in the History of Babylonian Astronomy,” Bulletin of the 

Society for Mesopotamian Studies, Vol. 5 (Toronto, May 1983), pp. 20, 21. 

30 C. B. F. Walker, ‘Babylonian observations of Saturn during the reign of 

Kandalanu,” in N. M. Swerdlow (ed.), Ancient Astronomy and Celestial Divination 

(Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London: The MIT Press, 2000), pp. 61–76. 

31 Walker, ibid., p. 63.


Besides this, each year is covered by two lines in the text, one for 

the last appearance of the planet and the other for its first, the total 

number of lines covering the fourteen years, therefore, being 

twenty-eight. With this framework there is no problem in restoring 

the year numbers that are damaged. 

Most of the positions given for Saturn at its first or last appearance 

are legible. 32 The entry for year eight, which is almost wholly 

preserved, is quoted here as an example: 

Year 8, month 6, day 5, behind the Furrow (α+ Virginis), last 

appearance. 

[Year 8], month 7, day 5, ‘between’ the Furrow (α+ Virginis) 

and the Balance (Libra), first appearance. 33 

What is the implication of this astronomical tablet for the 

chronology of the Neo-Babylonian era? 

As noted, Saturn has a revolution of 29.5 years, which also 

means that the planet moves through the whole ecliptic in this 

period. 

But for the planet to be seen again at a specific point (close to a 

certain fixed star, for example) of the ecliptic at the same time of the 

year, we have to wait for 59 solar years (2 x 29.5). This interval, 

actually, is much longer in the Babylonian lunar calendar. As C. B. 

F. Walker explains: 

A complete cycle of Saturn phenomena in relation to the stars 

takes 59 years. But when that cycle has to be fitted to the lunar 

calendar of 29 or 30 days then identical cycles recur at intervals of 

rather more than 17 centuries. Thus there is no difficulty in 

determining the date of the present text. 34 

In other words, the absolute chronology of Kandalanu’s reign is 

definitely fixed by the Saturn tablet, because the pattern of 

positions described in the text and fixed to specific dates in the 

Babylonian lunar calendar is not repeated again in more than seventeen 

centuries! The first fourteen years of his reign mentioned in the 

document are thus fixed to 647–634 B.C.E. As Kandalanu’s total 

reign may chronologically be counted as twenty-two years 

32 In three cases the dates given for the first or last appearance are followed by the 

comment “not observed”, the reason in two cases being said to be clouds; and in 

another case it is said to have been “computed” (for the same reason). As 

suggested by Walker, “in these cases the date of theoretical first or last visibility 

was deduced from the planet’s position when first or last actually seen.” —Ibid., 

pp. 64, 65, 74. 

33 Ibid., p. 65. 

34 1bid., p. 63.


(twenty-one years plus one year “after Kandalanu”; see section A-2 

above), our tablet establishes the absolute chronology of his reign 

as 647–626 B.C.E. 35 

Like the previous text discussed earlier (B.M. 32312), the 

Saturn tablet puts a definite block to the attempts at lengthening 

the chronology of the Neo-Babylonian period. If twenty years were 

to be added to this period, the reign of Nabopolassar, the father of 

Nebuchadnezzar, would have to be moved from 625–605 back to 

645–625 B.C.E., and this in turn would mean moving the reign of 

his predecessor, Kandalanu, from 647–626 back to 667–646 B.C.E. 

The astronomical data on the Saturn tablet makes such changes 

completely impossible. 

C. THE LUNAR ECLIPSE TABLETS 

Many of the Babylonian astronomical tablets contain reports of 

consecutive lunar eclipses , dated to the year, month, and often also 

the day of the reigning king. About forty texts of this type, 

recording several hundreds of lunar eclipses from 747 to about 50 

B.C.E., were catalogued by Abraham J. Sachs in 1955. 36 

In about a third of the texts the eclipses are arranged in 18-year 

groups, evidently because the Babylonians knew that the pattern of 

lunar eclipses is repeated at intervals of approximately 18 years and 

11 days, or exactly 223 lunar months (= 6585 1/3 days). This cycle 

was used by the Babylonian astronomers “to predict the dates of 

possible eclipses by at least the middle of the 6th century B.C. and 

most probably long before that.” 37 

As modern scholars call this cycle the Saros cycle, the 18-year 

texts are often referred to as the Saros cycle texts. 38 Some of these 

texts record series of 18-year intervals extending over several 

centuries. 

35 In his earlier discussion of the tablet, Walker points out that the pattern of Saturn 

phenomena described in this text, dated in terms of the phase of the moon, “will in 

fact occur approximately every 1770 years:”—C. B. F. Walker, “Episodes in the 

History of Babylonian Astronomy,” Bulletin of the Society for Mesopotamian Studies, 

Vol. 5 (Toronto, May 1983), p. 20. 

36 Abraham J. Sachs, Late Babylonian Astronomical and Related Texts (Providence, 

Rhode Island: Brown University Press, 1955), pp. xxxi–xxxiii. See nos. 1413–30, 

1432, 1435–52, and 1456–57. For translations of most of these, see now H. 

Hunger et al, Astronomical Diaries and Related Texts from Babylonia (ADT), Vol. V 

(Vienna, 2001). 

37 Paul-Alain Beaulieu and John P. Britton, ‘Rituals for an eclipse possibility in the 

8th year of Cyrus,” in Journal of Cuneiform Studies, Vol.46 (1994), p. 83. 

38 The Greek word saros is derived from the Babylonian word SAR, which actually 

denoted a period of 3,600 years. “The use of the term ‘Saros’ to denote the eclipse 

cycle of 223 months is a modem anachronism which originated with Edmund 

Halley [Phil. Trans. (1691) 535–40] . . . The Babylonian name for this interval was 

simply ‘18 years’ “ — Beaulieu & Britton, op. cit., p.78, note 11.


Lunar Eclipse 

Lunar eclipses are possible only at full moon, when the earth is 

between the moon and the sun and the moon may enter the 

shadow of the earth. This would occur at every full moon if the 

moon’s orbital plane were the same as the earth’s orbital plane 

(the ecliptic). But as the moon’s orbital plane is inclined about 5° 

to the ecliptic, lunar eclipses can occur only when the moon, on 

approaching its full phase, is close to one of two points (the nodes) 

where its orbit intersects with the ecliptic. This occurs at about 

every eighth full moon on the average, which means there are 

about 1.5 lunar eclipses per year, although they are not evenly 

dispersed in time. 

Most of the lunar eclipse texts were compiled during the Seleucid 

era (312–64 B.C.E.). The evidence is that the eclipse records were 

extracted from astronomical diaries by the Babylonian 

astronomers, who evidently had access to a large number of diaries 

from earlier centuries. 39 Thus, even if most of the diaries from the 

39 “It is all but certain that these eclipse records could have been extracted only from 

the astronomical diaries.” — A. J. Sachs, “Babylonian observational astronomy,” in 

F. R. Hodson (ed.), The Place of Astronomy in the Ancient World (Philosophical 

Transactions of the Royal Society of London, ser. A. 276, 1974), p. 44. See also the 

comments by F. Richard Stephenson and Louay J. Fatoohi, “Lunar eclipse times 

recorded in Babylonian history,” in Journal for the History of Astronomy, Vol. 24:4, 

No. 77 (1993), p. 256.


earliest centuries are missing, many of their entries on eclipses have 

been preserved in these excerpts. 

Many of the eclipse texts were copied by T. G. Pinches and J. N. 

Strassmaier in the latter part of the nineteenth century, and these 

copies were published by A. Sachs in 1955. 40 Translations of a few 

of the texts appeared in print in 1991. 41 The rest of the texts, 

translated by H. Hunger, were published in ADT V, 2001. (See 

footnote 36 above.) 

A preliminary typescript with transliterations and translations of 

most of the lunar eclipse texts was prepared in 1973 by Professor 

Peter Huber, but he never brought it into a form ready for 

publication, although it has been unofficially circulated among 

scholars for a long time. Huber’s memoir has been consulted in the 

following discussion, but every passage used has been checked, and 

in several cases improved upon or corrected, by Professor 

Hermann Hunger, whose transliterations and translations of these 

eclipse texts have since been published. 

The texts recording the earliest lunar eclipses are LBAT 1413– 

1421 in Sachs’ catalogue. Only the last four of these, nos. 1418– 

1421, contain eclipses from the Neo-Babylonian period. But as 

LBAT 1417 contains eclipses from the reigns of Shamashshumukin 

and Kandalanu, the last two Babylonian kings prior to the Neo- 

Babylonian period (cf. sections A-2 and B above), this text, too, is 

an important witness to the length of the Neo-Babylonian period. 

A discussion of four of these texts and their implications for the 

Neo-Babylonian chronology of the Watch Tower Society is 

presented in the following section. 42 

40 A. J. Sachs, op. cit. (1955; see note 36 above), pp. 223ff. 

41 A. Aaboe, J. P. Britton, J. A. Henderson, O. Neugebauer, and A. J. Sachs, “Saros 

Cycle Dates and Related Babylonian Astronomical Texts,” in Transactions of the 

American Philosophical Society, Vol. 81:6 (1991), pp. 1–75. The Saros cycle texts 

published are those designated LBAT 1422, 1423, 1424, 1425, and 1428 in Sachs 

catalogue. As these texts belong to a separate small group of theoretical texts, none 

of them are used in the present study. (See J. M. Steele in H. Hunger, ADT V, 

(2001), p. 390.) 

42 A discussion of LBAT 1418 is not included here, as this is one of the theoretical 

texts ‘referred to in note 41 above. It contains no royal names , just year numbers. 

(Royal names are usually mentioned only with a ruler’s first year.) Still, as pointed 

out by Professor Hermann Hunger, “the records of lunar eclipses are detailed 

enough that they can be dated.” The preserved part of the text gives years and 

months of lunar eclipse possibilities at 18-year intervals from 647 to 574 B.C.E. 

The eclipses dated in the text at 18-year intervals to years “2”, “20”, “16”, and “13”, 

for example, correspond to eclipses in years “2” and “20” of Kandalanu (646/45 

and 628/27 B.C.E.), year “16” of Nabopolassar (610/09), and year “13” of 

Nebuchadnezzar (592/91). Thus LBAT 1418 strongly supports the chronology 

established for the reigns of these kings. —A transliteration and translation of this 

tablet is published by Hunger, ADT V (2001), pp. 88, 89.


The lunar eclipse table LBAT 1417 

The tablet records four lunar eclipses at 18-year intervals dated to 

the 3rd year of Sennacherib, the accession year and 18th year of 

Shamashshumukin, and the 16th year of Kandalanu. The four 

eclipses may be shown to have occurred on April 22, 686; May 2, 

668; May 13, 650, and on May 23, 632 B.C.E. — Published by A. 

J. Sachs, Late Babylonian Astronomical and Related Texts (Providence, 

Rhode Island: Brown University Press, 1955), p. 223. 

C-1: The lunar eclipse tablet LBAT 1417 

LBAT 1417 records four lunar eclipses at 18-year intervals from 

686 to 632 B.C.E .It seems to be a part of the same tablet as the 

previous two texts in the series, LBAT 1415 and 1416. The first 

entry records an eclipse from Sennacherib third year of reign in 

Babylonia, 43 which may be identified with the eclipse that took 

place on April 22, 686 B.C.E. Unfortunately, the year number is 

damaged and only partially legible. 

The next entry, dated to the accession year of 

Shamashshumukin, gives this information: 

Accession year Shamash-shum-ukin, 

Ayyaru, 5 months, 

which passed by. 

At 40° after sunrise. 

43 Babylonian chronicles and king lists show that the Assyrian king Sennacherib also, 

for two periods, was the actual ruler of Babylonia, the first time for two years 

(dated to 704–703 B.C.E.), and the second time for eight years (dated to 688–681 

B.C.E.). Our text evidently refers to the second period.


At a cursory glance this report seems to give very little 

information. But there is more in the few brief lines than one might 

possibly imagine. 

The Babylonian astronomers had developed such an abbreviated 

technical terminology in describing the various celestial phenomena 

that their reports assumed an almost stenographic character. The 

Akkadian phrase translated “which passed by” (shá DIB), for 

example, was used in connection with a predicted eclipse to indicate 

that it would not be observable. 

As Hermann Hunger explains, “the eclipse was known to the 

Babylonians as occurring at a time when the moon could not be 

observed. It does not show that they looked for an eclipse and were 

disappointed that it did not occur.” 44 The Babylonians had not only 

computed this eclipse some time in advance by means of a known 

cycle (perhaps the Saros cycle); their computation also showed it 

would not be observable from the Babylonian horizon. 

This is also implied in the next line, “At 40° after sunrise.” 40° is 

a reference to the movement of the celestial sphere, which, due to 

the rotation of the earth, is seen to make a full circle in 24 hours. 

The Babylonians divided up this period into 360 time units 

(degrees) called USH, each of which corresponded to four of our 

minutes. The text, therefore, tells us that the eclipse had been 

calculated to begin 160 minutes (40 USH x 4) after sunrise, which 

means it would take place in the daytime and thus not be 

observable in Babylonia. 

Modern astronomical calculations confirm this. If 

Shamashhumukin’s first year was 667/66 B.C.E. as is generally held 

(see above, section A-2), his accession year was 668/67. The eclipse 

is dated to Ayyaru, the second month, which began in April or 

May. (The “5 months” indicates the time interval from the 

previous eclipse.) 

Was there an eclipse of the type described in our text at that 

time of the year in 668 B.C.E.? Yes, there was. 

Modern lunar eclipse catalogues show that such an eclipse took 

place on May 2, 668 B.C.E. (Julian calendar). It began at about 9:20 

local time*, which only roughly agrees with the Babylonian 

computation that it would begin 160 minutes —2 hours and 40 

44 Letter Hunger–Jonsson, dated October 21, 1989. (Cf. also note 15 above.) In a later 

letter (dated June 26, 1990) Hunger adds: “The technical expression if the observer 

waits for an eclipse and finds that it does not occur is ‘not seen when watched 

for’.” 

*Note: Times listed in this discussion are according to a 24-hour format, rather than 

the 12 hour a.m./p.m format.


minutes — after sunrise. As sunrise occurred at about 5:20, the 

error in computation was ca. 1 hour and 20 minutes. 45 

In the chronology of the Watch Tower Society the accession 

year of Shamashshumukin is moved back twenty years to 688/87 

B.C.E. No lunar eclipses occurred in April or May that year, but 

there was a total one on June 10, 688 B.C.E. Contrary to the eclipse 

recorded in our text, however, this one was observable in Babylonia. 

It is, therefore, an impossible alternative. 

The next entry in the text is dated to the eighteenth year of 

Shamashshumukin, that is, 650/49 B.C.E. This eclipse, too, was a 

computed one, predicted to “pass by” in the second month. It 

would begin about four hours (60 USH) “before sunset”. 

According to modern calculations the eclipse took place on May 

13, 650 B.C.E. The canon of Liu and Fiala shows it began at 16:25 

and ended at 18:19, about half an hour before sunset at that time of 

the year. 46 

According to the chronology of the Watch Tower Society this 

eclipse occurred twenty years earlier, in 670 B.C.E. No lunar 

eclipses took place in April or May that year, but there was a total 

one on June 22, 670 B.C.E. However, it did not occur “before 

sunset”, as did the one recorded in our text, but early in the 

forenoon, beginning about 7:30. So, again, it does not fit. 

The next and last entry in LBAT 1417 is dated to the sixteenth 

year of Kandalanu. The eclipse recorded was observed in Babylonia 

and several important details are given: 

(Year) 16 Kandalanu 

(month) Simanu, 5 months, day 15.2 Fingers (?) 

on the northeast side covered (?) 

On the north it became bright. The north wind [blew] 

20° onset, maxima1 phase, [and clearing.] 

Behind Antares (α Scorpio) [it was eclipsed.] 

As indicated by the question marks and the square brackets, the 

text is somewhat damaged at places, but the information preserved 

45 See Bao-Lin and Alan D. Fiala, Canon of Lunar Eclipses 1500 B.C.–AD. 3000 

(Richmond, Virginia: Willman-Bell, Inc., 1992), p. 66, No. 2010. As demonstrated 

in Dr. J. M. Steele’s detailed study of the Babylonian lunar eclipses, the accuracy 

of Babylonian timings of observed eclipses was within about half an hour as 

compared to modem calculations, while the accuracy of the timings of predicted 

eclipses usually was about an hour and half. It should be noted that before about 

570 B.C.E. the Babylonians also rounded off their timings to the nearest 5–10 USH 

(20–40 minutes). Although rough, these timings are close enough for the eclipses 

to be identified. (See John M. Steele, Observations and Predictions of Eclípse Times 

by Early Astronomers, Dordrecht, etc: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2000, pp. 57– 

75, 231–235.) For further comments on the identification of ancient 1unar 

eclipses, see the Appendix for chapter four: “Some comments on ancient lunar 

eclipses”. 

46 Liu/Fiala, op. cit., p. 67, No 2056. Steele’s computation shows it began at 16:45.


is sufficient for identifying the eclipse. It took place on “day 15” of 

Simanu, the third month, which began in May or June. “2 fingers” 

means it was partial, with only two twelfths of the moon’s diameter 

being eclipsed. The total duration of the eclipse was 20°, that is, 80 

minutes. 

If Kandalanu’s sixteenth year began on Nisan 1, 632 B.C.E., as 

is generally held (compare above, sections A-2 and B), we want to 

know if there was a 1unar eclipse of this type in the third month of 

that year. 

Modern calculations show there was. According to the eclipse 

canon of Liu and Fiala the eclipse began on May 23, 632 B.C.E. at 

23:51 and lasted until 1:07 on May 24, which means its total 

duration was about 76 minutes, that is, very close to the period 

given in the text. The same canon gives the magnitude as 0.114. 47 

These data are in good agreement with the ancient record. In the 

chronology of the Watch Tower Society, however, this eclipse 

should be looked for twenty years earlier, in May, June, or possibly 

July, 652 B.C.E. It is true that there was an eclipse on July 2 that 

year, but in contrast to the partial one recorded in our text it was 

total. But as it began about 15:00. no phase of it was observable in 

Babylonia. 

In summary, LBAT 1417 records four lunar eclipses at successive 

18-year intervals (18 years and nearly 11 days), all of which may be 

easily identified with those of April 21, 686; May 2, 668; May 13, 

650, and May 23, 632 B.C.E. The four eclipse records are interlaced 

by the successive Saros cycles into a pattern that fit no other series 

of years in the seventh century B.C.E. 48 

The last three dates are thus established as the absolute dates of 

the accession year and the eighteenth year of Shamashshumukin 

and the sixteenth year of Kandalanu, respectively. The Watch 

Tower Society’s attempt to add twenty years to the Neo- 

Babylonian era, in that way moving the reigns of the earlier kings 

twenty years backwards in time, is once again effectively blocked by 

a Babylonian astronomical tablet, this time by the lunar eclipse text 

LBAT 1417. 


LBAT 1419 records an uninterrupted series of lunar eclipses at 

47 Liu/Fiala, ap. cit., p. 68, No. 2103. 

48 It is to be noted that the Saros cycle does not comprise an even number of days; it 

consists of 6,585 1/3 days. The excess third part of a day (or c: a 7.5 hours) 

implies that the subsequent eclipses in the series are not repeated at the same time 

of the day, but about 7.5 hours later after each successive cycle. The duration and 

magnitude, too, are changing from one eclipse to the next in the cycle. An eclipse, 

therefore, cannot be mixed up with the previous or the next ones in the series. — 

See the discussion by Beaulieu and Britton, op. cit. (note 37 above), pp. 78–84.


18-year intervals from 609/08 to 447/46 B.C.E. The first entries, 

which evidently recorded eclipses that ocurred in September 609 

and March 591 B.C.E., are damaged. Royal names and year 

numbers are illegible. However, two of the following entries are 

clearly dated to the reign of Nebuchadnezzar (the words in 

parentheses are added to elucidate the laconic reports): 

14th (year of) Nebukadnezar, 

month VI, (eclipse) which was omitted [literally, “passed by”] 

at sunrise, 

…………….. 

32nd (year of) Nebukadnezar, 

month VI, (eclipse) which was omitted. 

At 35° (= 35 USH, i.e. 140 minutes) before sunset. 

The royal name in the original text is written as “Kudurri”, 

which is an abbreviation of Nabu-kudurri-usur, the transcribed 

Akkadian form of Nebuchadnezzar. 

Nebuchadnezzar’s fourteenth and thirty-second years are 

generally dated to 591/90 and 573/72 B.C.E., respectively. The 

two eclipses recorded, one Saros cycle apart, both took place in the 

sixth month (Ululu), which began in August or September. Both 

eclipses had been calculated in advance, and the Babylonians knew 

that none of them would be observable in Babylonia. The first 

eclipse began “at sunrise”, the second 140 minutes (35 USH) 

“before sunset.” Thus both of them occurred in the daytime in 

Babylonia. 

This is confirmed by modem calculations. The first eclipse 

occurred on September 15, 591 B.C.E. It began about 6:00. The 

second took place in the afternoon on September 25, 573 B.C.E. 49 

Both eclipses, then, fit in very well with the chronology established 

for the reign of Nebuchadnezzar. 

In the chronology of the Watch Tower Society, however, the 

two eclipses should be sought for twenty years earlier, in 611 and 

593 B.CE. But no eclipses that fit those described in the text 

occurred in the autumn of any of those years. 50 

The next entry, which records the subsequent eclipse in the 18- 

year cycle, gives the following detailed information: 

49 Liu and Fiala, op. cit., pp. 69–70, Nos. 2210 and 2256. The entries also record 

eclipses in the twelfth month of both years, but the text is severely damaged at 

both places. 

50 On Sept. 26, 611 and Oct. 7, 593 B.C.E. there were so-called penumbral eclipses, 

i.e., the moon passed through the half-shadow (penumbra) outside the shadow 

(umbra) of the earth. (Liu & Fiala, op. cit., pp. 68–69, nos. 2158 and 2205.) Such 

passages are hardly observable even at night, and the Babylonians evidently 

recorded them as “passed by’ . The first eclipse (Sept. 26, 611 B.C.E.) began well 

after sunset, not at sunrise as is explicitly stated in the text. The penumbral phase 

of the second eclipse (Oct. 7, 593 B.C.E.) began well before sunrise, not before 

sunset as stated in the text. Both alternatives, therefore, are definitely out of the 

question anyway.


Month VII, the 13th, in 17° on the east side 

all (of the moon) was covered. 28° maximal phase. 

In 20 ° it cleared from east to west. 

Its eclipse was red. 

Behind the rump of Aries it was eclipsed. 

During onset, the north wind blew, during clearing, the west 

wind. At 55° before sunrise. 

As stated in the text, this eclipse took place on the thirteenth 

day of the seventh month (Tashritu), which began in September or 

October. The royal name and the year number unfortunately are 

missing. 

Yet, as Professor Hunger points out, “the eclipse can 

nevertheless be identified with certainty from the observations 

given.” 51 The various details about the eclipse—its magnitude (total), 

duration (the total phase lasting 112 minutes), and position (behind 

the rump of Aries)—clearly identify it with the eclipse that took 

place in the night of Oct. 6–7, 555 B.C.E. 52 

According to the generally established chronology for the Neo- 

Babylonian period, this eclipse took place in the first year of 

Nabonidus, which began on Nisan 1, 555 B.C.E. Although the 

royal name and year number are missing, it is of the utmost 

importance to notice that the text places this eclipse one Saros cycle 

after the eclipse in the thirty-second year of Nebuchadnezzar. As the last 

eclipse may be securely dated in 555 B.C.E., it at once also places 

Nebuchadnezzar’s thirty-second year eighteen years earlier, in 573 

B.C.E. 

Consequently, all three eclipses in our text concur in establishing 

591 and 573 B.C.E. as the absolute dates of Nebuchadnezzar’s 

14th and 32nd regnal years, respectively. 

The Saros cycle text LBAT 1419 thus provides yet another 

independent evidence against 607 B.C.E. as the eighteenth year of 

Nebuchadnezzar. If, as is established by the text, his thirty-second 

year was 573/72 B.C.E. and his fourteenth year was 591/90 B.C.E., 

then his first year was 604/03, and his eighteenth year, in which he 

desolated Jerusalem, was 587/86 B.C.E. 

51 Letter Hunger-Jonsson, dated October 21, 1989. 

52 According to the calculations of Liu and Fiala the eclipse, which was total, began 

on October 6 at 21:21 and ended on October 7 at 1:10 The total phase lasted from 

22:27 to 0:04, i.e. for 97 minutes, which is not far from the figure given in the text, 

28 USH (112 minutes).—Liu and Fiala, op. cit., p.70, n. 2301.



Instead of recording eclipses at 18-year intervals, LBAT 1420 

contains annual eclipse reports. All eclipses in the text are from the 

reign of Nebuchadnezzar, dating from his first year (604/03 

B.C.E.) to at least his twenty-ninth year (576/75 B.C.E.). 

The first entry, which records two eclipses that “passed by” 

(that is, though correctly predicted would not be observable), is 

damaged and the year number is illegible. But the last part of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s name is preserved: 

[(Year) 1 Nebuchadn]ezzar, (month) Simanu. 

The name of the king is not repeated in the subsequent entries, 

indicating that the king is the same during the whole period. This is 

also confirmed by the continuous series of increasing year numbers 

right until the last year preserved in the text, “(Year) 29”. 

The entries recording eclipses in the period 603–595 B.C.E. are 

very damaged, too, and the year numbers for this period are 

missing. The first entry in which the year number is preserved 

records two eclipses from the eleventh year: 

(Year) 11, (month) Ayyaru [. . . . . .] 10(?) USH after sunset and it 

was total. 10 [+x . . .] (Month) Arahsamnu, which passed by. 

Addaru 2 . 

The eleventh year of Nebuchadnezzar began on Nisan 1, 594 

B.C.E. “Addaru2” is added to indicate that there was an intercalary 

month at the end of the year. 

There is no problem in finding both of these eclipses. Ayyaru, 

the second month, began in April or May, and Arahsamnu, the 

eighth month, began in October or November. The first eclipse 

occurred on May 23, and the second one on November 17. The 

eclipse canon of Liu and Fiala confirms that the first eclipse was 

total and was observable in Babylonia, as stated in the text. It began 

at 20:11 and ended at 23:48. The second eclipse “passed by” (was 

unobservable) as it occurred in the daytime. According to the 

canon of Liu and Fiala it began at 7.08 and ended at 9:50. 53 

Most of the year numbers from the twelfth to the seventeenth 

year (593/92–588/87 B.C.E.) are legible. 54 Thirteen lunar eclipses 

53 Liu & Fiala, op. cit., p.69, nos. 2201 and 2202. 

54 In the entries for the fourteenth and fifteenth years the year numbers are damaged 

and only partially legible. But as these entries stand between those for years “13” 

and “16”, the damaged numbers obviously were “14” and “15”.


are described and dated in this period, eight of which “passed by” 

and five were observed. Modern calculations confirm that all these 

eclipses occurred in the period 593–588 B.C.E. 

After the seventeenth year there is a gap in the record until the 

twenty-fourth year. The entry for that year records two eclipses, 

but the text is damaged and most of it is illegible. From then on, 

however, year numbers and also most of the text are well 

preserved. 

These entries contain annual records of a total of nine eclipses 

(five observable and four that “passed by”) dating from the twentyfifth 

to the twenty-ninth year (580/79–576/75 B.C.E.). There are 

no difficulties in identifying any of these eclipses. They all occurred 

in the period 580–575 B.C.E. It would be tiresome and useless to 

expose the reader to a detailed examination of all these reports. 

The entry for year “25” may suffice as an example: 

(Year) 25, (month) Abu, 1 1/2 beru after sunset. 

(Month) Shabatu, it occurred in the evening watch. 

Abu, the fifth Babylonian month, began in July or August. The 

Babylonians divided our 24-hour day into twelve parts called beru. 

One beru, therefore, was two hours. The first eclipse is said to have 

occurred 1 1/2 beru, that is, three hours, after sunset. As 

Nebuchadnezzar’s twenty-fifth year is dated to 580/79 B.C.E., this 

eclipse should be found in July or August that year, about three 

hours after sunset. 

The eclipse is not difficult to identify. According to the canon of 

Liu and Fiala it was a total eclipse which began on August 14, 580 

B.C.E. at 21:58 and ended at 1:31 on August 15. 55 

The next eclipse occurred six months later in Shabatu, the 

eleventh month, which began in January or February. It is said to 

have occurred “in the evening watch” (the first of the three 

watches of the night). 

This eclipse, too, is easy to find. It took place on February 8, 

579 B.C.E. and lasted from 18:08 to 20:22. according to the canon 

of Liu and Fiala. 56 

In the chronology of the Watch Tower Society the twenty-fifth 

year of Nebuchadnezzar is dated twenty years earlier, in 600/599 

B.C.E. But no lunar eclipses observable in Babylonia occurred in 

600 BCE. And although there was an eclipse in the night of 

February 19–20, 599 B.C.E., it did not occur “in the evening 

watch” as the one reported in our text. 57 

55 Liu & Fiala, op. cit., p. 69, no. 2238. Sunset occurred at ca. 19:00. 

56 Ibid., p. 69, no. 2239. 

57 Ibid., p. 69, no. 2188. The eclipse began at 23:30 and ended at 2:25. There were 

four eclipses in 600 B.C.E. (Liu & Fiala, nos. 2184–87), but al1 these were 

penumbral and thus not observable (see note 50 above).


Details on some two dozens of lunar eclipses, dated to specific years 

and months in the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, are preserved on 

LBAT 1420. Not one of them is found to agree with the Watch 

Tower Society’s chronology for the reign of Nebuchadnezzar. 

Together these lunar eclipses form an irregular but very distinct 

pattern of events scattered over the first twenty-nine years of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s reign. Only on the assumption that his reign 

began in 604 B.C.E. do we find a far-reaching correspondence 

between this pattern and the celestial events that gave rise to it. But 

if Nebuchadnezzar’s reign is moved back one, two, five, ten, or 

twenty years, this correlation between the records and reality 

immediately dissolves. LBAT 1420 alone, therefore, suffices to 

disprove completely the idea that the eighteenth year of 

Nebuchadnezzar should be dated to 607 B.C.E. 


The preserved part of LBAT 1421 records two eclipses observed in 

Babylonia in the sixth and twelfth month of year “42”, evidently of 

the reign of Nebuchadnezzar: 

(Year) 42, (month) Ululu, (day) 14. It rose eclipsed [. . .] 

and became bright. 6 (USH) to become bright. 

At 35° [before sunset] . 

(Month) Addaru, (day) 15, 1,30° after sunset [. . .]. 

25° duration of maximal phase. In 18° it [became bright.] 

West(wind) went. 2 cubits below 

γ Virginis eclipsed 

[. . . . . .] 

Provided that these eclipses occurred in the forty-second year of 

Nebuchadnezzar—and there was no other Babylonian king ruling 

that long in the sixth, seventh, or eighth centuries B.C.E.—they 

should be looked for in 563/62 B .C.E. And there is no difficulty 

in identifying them: The first, dated in the sixth month, occurred 

on September 5, 563 B.C.E., and the second one, dated in the 

twelfth month, occurred on March 2–3, 562 B.C.E. 

The first eclipse “rose eclipsed”, meaning that it began some 

time before sunset, so that when the moon rose (at about 18:30 at 

that time of the year), it was already eclipsed. This agrees with 

modern calculations, which show that the eclipse began about 

17:00 and lasted until about 19:00. 58 

58 Liu & Fiala, op. cit., p. 70, no. 2281.


The lunar eclipse tablet LBAT 1421 

The tablet records two lunar eclipses dated to months six and 

twelve of year "42," evidently of Nebuchadnezzar. The details 

given help to identify them with eclipses that occurred on 

September 5, 563 and March 2-3, 562 B.C.E. respectively. — 

From A. J. Sachs, Late Babylonian Astronomical and Related Texts 

(Providence, Rhode Island: Brown University Press, 1955), p. 

223. 

The canon of Liu and Fiala confirms that the second eclipse was 

total. “1,30° [six hours] after sunset” probably refers to the 

beginning of the total phase, which began after midnight, at 0:19, 

and lasted until 2:03, i.e. it lasted for 104 minutes. 59 This is in good 

agreement with our text, which gives the duration of the maximal 

phase as 25 USH, that is, 100 minutes. 

In the chronology of the Watch Tower Society, 

Nebuchadnezzar’s forty-second year is dated to 583/82 B .C.E. But 

no eclipses of the type described in our text occurred in that year. 

A possible alternative to the first one might have been that of 

October 16, 583 B.C.E., had it not began too late—at 19:45 

according to Liu and Fiala—to be observed at moonrise (which 

occurred at about 17:30). And as for the second eclipse, there were 

no eclipses at all that could be observed in Babylonia in 582 

B.C.E. 60 

The lunar eclipse texts presented above provide four additional 

independent evidences for the length of the Neo-Babylonian 

period. 

59 Ibid., p. 70, no. 2282. Sunset began ca. 18:00. 

60 In 582 B.C.E. there were four lunar eclipses, but all of them were penumbral. — 

Liu & Fiala, op. cit., p.69, nos. 2231–34.


The first text (LBAT 1417) records lunar eclipses from the 

accession year and eighteenth year of Shamash-shum-ukin and the 

sixteenth year of Kandalanu, turning these years into absolute dates 

that effectively block any attempt to add even one year to the Neo- 

Babylonian period, far less twenty. 

The other three texts (LBAT 1419, 1420, and 1421) records 

dozens of lunar eclipses dated to various years within the reign of 

Nebuchadnezzar, thus time and again turning his reign into an 

absolute chronology. It is like fastening a painting to a wall with 

dozens of nails all over it, although but one would suffice. 

Similarly, it would have sufficed to establish only one of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s regnal years as an absolute date to overthrow 

the idea that his eighteenth year began in 607 B.C.E. 

Before concluding this section on the lunar eclipse texts, it 

seems necessary to forestall an anticipated objection to the 

evidence provided by these texts. As the Babylonian astronomers 

as early as in the seventh century B.C.E. were able to compute in 

advance certain astronomical events such as eclipses, could it be that 

they also, in the later Seleucid era, were able to retrocalculate lunar 

eclipses and attach them to the chronology established for the 

earlier centuries? Could the lunar eclipse texts simply be the results 

of such a procedure? 61 

It is certainly true that the various cycles used by the 

Babylonians for predicting eclipses just as well could be used for 

retrocalculating eclipses, and there is a particular small group of 

tablets showing that Seleucid astronomers did extrapolate such 

cycles backwards in time. 62 

However, the observational texts record a number of 

phenomena that were impossible for the Babylonians to predict or 

retrocalculate. Of the records in the diaries and planetary texts 

61 This idea was held by A. T. Olmstead, who in an article published back in 1937 (in 

Classical Philology, Vol. XXXII, pp. 5f.) criticized Kugler’s use of some of the eclipse 

texts. As explained later by A. J. Sachs, Olmstead “completely misunderstood the 

nature of a group of Babylonian astronomical texts which Kugler used. He was 

under the misapprehension that they were computed at a later date and hence of 

dubious historical value; in reality, they are compilations of extracts taken directly 

from authentic, contemporary Astronomical Diaries and must therefore be handled 

with great respect”—A. J. Sachs & D. J. Wiseman, “A Babylonian King List of the 

Hellenistic Period,” Iraq, Vol. XVI (1954), p. 207, note 1. 

62 These texts do not record any observations at all and are, therefore, classified as 

theoretical texts. They are quite different from the diaries and the eclipse texts 

discussed above. Five such theoretical texts are known, four of which were 

published by Aaboe et al in 1991 (see note 41 above). Two of these are known as 

the “Saros Canon” (LBAT 1428) and the “Solar Saros” (LBAT 1430). The fifth tablet 

is LBAT 1418, described in note 42 above.—See J. M. Steele in Hunger, ADT V 

(2001),p. 390.


Professor N. M. Swerdlow points out that, although the distances 

of planets from normal stars could be predicted, “Conjunctions of 

planets with the moon and other planets, with their distances, 

could neither be calculated by the ephemerides nor predicted by 

periodicities.” 63 With respect to lunar eclipses, the Babylonians 

could predict and retrocalculate their occurrences, “but none of the 

Babylonian methods could have allowed them to calculate 

circumstances such as the direction of the eclipse shadow and the 

visibility of planets during the eclipse.” 64 

Thus, although the Babylonians were able to calculate certain 

astronomical phenomena, the observational texts record a number 

of details connected with the observations that they were unable to 

predict or retrocalculate. This disproves conclusively the idea 

proposed by some that the data may have been calculated 

backwards from a later period. 


In the previous chapter the length of the Neo-Babylonian era was 

firmly established by seven different lines of evidence. All of them 

were based upon ancient Babylonian cuneiform texts such as 

chronicles, kinglists, royal inscriptions, and tens of thousands of 

economic, administrative, and legal documents from the Neo- 


In this chapter another seven independent evidences have been 

presented. All of these are based on ancient Babylonian astronomical 

texts, which provide a whole string of absolute dates from the sixth 

and seventh centuries B.C.E. These tablets establish—over and 

over again—the absolute chronology of the Neo-Babylonian era: 

63 N. M. Swerdlow, The Babylonian Theory of the Planets (Princeton University Press, 

1998), pp. 23, 173.—The diaries also record a number of other phenomena that 

could not be calculated, such as solar halos, river levels, and bad weather—clouds, 

rain, fog, mist, hail, lightning, winds, etc. Some data in the diaries were computed 

because of bad weather, but most are observations. This is also evident from the 

Akkadian name of the diaries engraved at the end of their edges: natsaru sha ginê, 

‘regular watching”. 

64 Communication J. M. Steele-Jonsson, dated March 27, 2003. As pointed out in 

footnote 45 above, there is also a clear difference of accuracy in the timings given 

for observed and predicted eclipses.


1) The Astronomical diary VAT 4956 

The diary VAT 4956 contains about thirty completely verified 

observed astronomical positions from Nebuchadnezzar’s thirtyseventh 

regnal year. 

Such a combination of astronomical positions is not duplicated 

again in thousands of years. Consequently, there is only one year 

which fits this situation: 568/67 B.C.E. 

If this was Nebuchadnezzar’s thirty-seventh regnal year, as is 

twice stated on this tablet, then 587/86 B.C.E. must have been his 

eighteenth year, in which he desolated Jerusalem. 

(2) The astronomical diary B.M. 32312 

B.M. 32312 is the oldest preserved astronomical diary. It records 

astronomical observations that enable scholars to date this tablet to 

652/51 B.C.E. 

A historical remark in the text, repeated in the Babylonian 

chronicle B.M. 86379 (the “Akitu Chronicle”) shows this to have 

been the sixteenth year of Shamashshumukin. The diary, then, fixes 

his twenty-year reign to 667–648 B.C.E., his successor Kandalanu’s 

twenty-two-year reign to 647–626, Nabopolassar’s twenty-one-year 

reign to 625–605, and Nebuchadnezzar’s forty-three-year reign to 

604–562 B.C.E. 

This, again, sets Nebuchadnezzar’s eighteenth year and the 

destruction of Jerusalem at 587/86 B.C.E. 

(3) The Saturn tablet B.M. 76738+76813 

The Saturn tablet records a successive series of positions of the planet 

Saturn at its first and last appearances , dated to the first fourteen years 

of Kandalanu. 

Such a pattern of positions, fixed to specific dates in the 

Babylonian lunar calendar, is not repeated again in more than 

seventeen centuries. 

This text, then, again fixes Kandalanu’s twenty-two-year reign to 

647–626 B.C.E., Nabopolassar’s twenty-one-year reign to 625–605, 

and Nebuchadnezzar’s reign to 604–562 B.C.E. 

(4) The lunar eclipse tablet LBAT 1417 

LBAT 1417 records four lunar eclipses, each succeeding the other at 

intervals of 18 years and nearly 11 days, an eclipse period known as 

the Saros cycle.


The eclipses are dated to the third year of Sennacherib’s reign in 

Babylonia, to the accession year and the eighteenth year of 

Shamashshumukin, and to the sixteenth year of Kandalanu, 

respectively. 

The four interrelated eclipses may be clearly identified with a 

series of eclipses that occurred in 686, 668, 650 and 632 B.C.E. 

This tablet, therefore, once again fixes the absolute chronology for 

the reigns of Shamashshumukin and Kandalanu, and also— 

indirectly for the reigns of Nabopolassar and Nebuchadnezzar. 


LBAT 1419 contains reports of an uninterrupted series of lunar eclipses 

at 18-year intervals directly from the Neo-Babylonian era itself. 

Two of the eclipses are dated to the fourteenth and thirtysecond 

years of Nebuchadnezzar. They may be identified with 

eclipses that occurred in 591 and 573 B.C.E., respectively, 

confirming again at these points the chronology established for the 

reign of this king. 

Although the royal name and year number are missing in the 

report on the next eclipse in the 18-year series, the very detailed 

information makes it easy to identify it with the eclipse that 

occurred on October 6–7, 555 B.C.E. This date, therefore, 

confirms and adds further strength to the two earlier dates in the 

18-year series, 573 and 591 B.C.E. 

As these years correspond to Nebuchadnezzar’s thirty-second 

and fourteenth years, respectively, his eighteenth year is, of course, 

once again fixed to 587/86 B.C.E. by this tablet. 


LBAT 1420 gives an annual record of lunar eclipses from the first to the 

twenty-ninth years of Nebuchadnezzar, except for a gap between 

his eighteenth and twenty-third years. The entries in which regnal 

year numbers are preserved—about a dozen—give details on some 

two dozens of eclipses, all of which are found exactly in the B.C.E. 

years that has been established earlier for the regnal years 

mentioned in the text. 

As this specific compound of dated lunar eclipses does not tally 

with any corresponding series of eclipses that occurred in the 

immediate preceding decades, this tablet alone suffices to establish 

the absolute chronology of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign. 65 

65 This tablet “was probably compiled shortly after –575 [576 BCE].”—J. M. Steele in 

Hunger, ADT V, p. 391.



LBAT 1421 records two eclipses dated in the sixth and twelfth 

months of year “42”, evidently of Nebuchadnezzar, generally dated 

to 563/62 B.CE. And both eclipses are also actually found in these 

months of that year. But no eclipses of the type recorded in the 

text occurred in 583/82 B.CE.―the date of Nebuchadnezzar’s 

forty-second year in the chronology of the Watch Tower Society. 

This tablet, therefore, provides an additional proof of the falsity of 

that chronology. 

(8-11) Another four astronomical tablets 

The seven astronomical texts discussed above provide more than 

enough evidence against the Watch Tower Society’s 607 B .C.E. 

date. And yet this is not all. Another four texts have recently been 

published that will be described only briefly here. Translations of 

three of these are published in Hunger, ADT V (2001). 

The first is LBAT 1415 which, as mentioned on page 174 above, 

is part of the same tablet as LBAT 1417. It records lunar eclipses 

dated to year 1 of Bel-ibni (702 B.C.E.), year 5, evidently of 

Sennacherib (684 B.C.E.), and year 2, evidently of Shamash-shumukin 

(666 B.C.E). 

The second is lunar eclipse text no. 5 in Hunger, ADT V. It is 

badly damaged and the royal name is missing, but some historical 

remarks in the text shows it is from the reign of Nabopolassar. 

One of the eclipses described is dated to year 16 and may be 

identified with the eclipse of September 15, 610 B.C.E. 

The third is text no. 52 in Hunger, ADT V. This is a planetary 

text containing over a dozen legible records of the positions of 

Saturn, Mars, and Mercury dated to years 14, 17, and 19 of 

Shamash-shum-ukin (654, 651, and 649 B.C.E), years 1, 12, and 16 

of Kandalanu (647, 636, and 632 B.C.E.), and years 7, 12, 13, and 

14 of Nabopolassar (619, 614, 613, and 612 B.C.E.). Like some of 

the previous texts discussed above, these three texts effectively 

prevent all attempts at lengthening the chronology of the Neo- 


The fourth is a planetary tablet, SBTU IV 171, which records 

first and last appearances and stationary points of Saturn in years 

28, 29, 30, and 31 of an unknown king. 66 However, as Professor 

Hermann Hunger has demonstrated, the year numbers combined 

with the position of Saturn in the constellation of Pabilsag (roughly 

Sagittarius) exclude all alternatives in the first millennium B.C.E. 

66 Hermann Hunger, “Saturn beobachtungen aus der Zeit Nebukadnezars II.,” 

Assyriologica et Semitica (=AOAT, Band 252), (Munster: Ugarit-Verlag, 2000), pp. 

189–192.


except years 28–31 of Nebuchadnezzar, fixing these to 577/76– 

574/73 B.C.E. Again, this establishes his 18th year as 587/86 

B.C.E. 

As has been clearly seen, the Watch Tower Society’s 

interpretation of the “Gentile Times” requires that these have a 

starting date of 607 B.C.E., their claimed date for the fall of 

Jerusalem. Since that event took place in Nebuchadnezzar’s 

eighteenth year, that regnal year must also be dated as of 607 

B.C.E. This creates a gap of twenty years when compared with all 

existing ancient historical records, since these place the start of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s eighteenth year in 587 B.C.E. How can this 

twenty-year gap possibly be explained? 

In this chapter it has been demonstrated that the ten 

astronomical texts presented establish the absolute chronology of 

the Neo-Babylonian period at a number of points, especially within 

the 43-year-reign of Nebuchadnezzar. Their combined witness 

proves beyond all reasonable doubt that his reign cannot be moved 

backwards in time even one year, far less twenty. 

Together with the evidence presented in Chapter 3, therefore, 

we now have seventeen different evidences, each of which in its own way 

overthrows the Watch Tower Society’s dating of Nebuchadnezzar’s 

eighteenth year to 607 B.C.E., showing it to have begun twenty 

years later, that is, in 587 B.C.E. 

Indeed, few reigns in ancient history may be dated with such 

conclusiveness as that of the Neo-Babylonian king 

Nebuchadnezzar. 

Suppose for a moment that Berossus’ figures for the reigns of the 

Neo-Babylonian kings contain an error of twenty years, as is 

required by the chronology of the Watch Tower Society. Then the 

compiler(s) of the Royal Canon must have made exactly the same 

mistake, evidently independently of Berossus! 

It might be argued, though, that both simply repeated an error 

contained in the sources they used, namely the Neo-Babylonian 

chronicles. Then the scribes of Nabonidus, too, who possibly used 

the same sources, would have had to have dropped twenty years 

from the reign of the same king (or kings) when they made the 

inscriptions of the Hillah stele and the Adad-guppi’ stele. 

Is it really likely, however, that those scribes, who wrote right 

during the Neo-Babylonian era, did not know the lengths of the reigns 

of the kings under whom they lived, especially since those reigns 

also functioned as calendar years by which they dated different 

events? 

If they really made such a strange mistake, how is it possible that 

contemporary scribes in Egypt also made the same mistake, 

dropping the same period of twenty years when making 

inscriptions on death stelae and other documents?


Curiously then, the Babylonian astronomers must also have 

regularly made similar “mistakes” when dating the observations 

recorded in VAT 4956, LBAT 1420, SBTU IV 171, and also other 

tablets from which later astronomers abstracted their Saros cycle 

eclipse records — unless of course changes were purposely made 

by copyists in the Seleucid era, as the Watch Tower Society posits. 

Still more incredible is the idea that scribes and astronomers 

could remove twenty years from the Neo-Babylonian era several 

years prior to that era—as is shown by the oldest diary, BM. 32312, 

the lunar eclipse tablets LBAT 1415+1416+1417 and ADTV, no. 

5, the Saturn tablet B.M.76738+76813 , and the planetary tablet 

ADT V, no.52—all the five of which inexorably block all attempts 

at lengthening the Neo-Babylonian period. 

But the most remarkable “coincidence” is this: Tens of thousands 

of dated economic, administrative and legal documents have been 

excavated from the Neo-Babylonian period, covering every year of 

this period—except, as the Watch Tower Society would have it, for 

a period of twenty years from which not one tablet has been found. 

Again, most curiously, according to this logic, that period 

happens to be exactly the same as that lost through a series of 

other “mistakes” by scribes in Babylon and Egypt, and by later 

copyists and historians. 

Either there was an international agreement during several 

centuries to erase this twenty-year period from the recorded history 

of the world—or it never existed! If such an international “plot” 

ever took place it was so successful that of all the tens of thousands 

of documents unearthed from the Neo-Babylonian era there is not 

one, not even a line in any of them, that indicates that such a twenty-year 

period ever existed. We can safely conclude, then, that the Watch 

Tower Society’s chronology is unquestionably in error. 

But if this is the conclusion of our study, how are we to 

harmonize this fact with the Biblical prophecy of the seventy years, 

during which the land of Judah and Jerusalem would lay desolate 

according to the Watch Tower Society? And how are we to view 

the year 1914, the supposed terminal date for the times of the 

Gentiles according to the prophetic time scale of the Watch Tower 

Society? Do not world events clearly show that Bible prophecies 

have been fulfilled since that year? These questions will be dealt 

with in the following chapters.

5 

THE SEVENTY YEARS FOR 

BABYLON 

T 

For thus says the LORD, “When 

seventy years have been completed for Babylon, I 

will visit you and fulfill my good word to you, to 

bring you back to this place.” — Jeremiah 

29:10, NASB. 

HE DATE 607 B.C.E. as given by Watchtower chronologists 

for the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple by the 

Babylonians is determined by adding the seventy years predicted by 

Jeremiah to 537 B.C.E., the date when the Jewish remnant are 

thought to have returned from exile. It is held that these seventy 

years were a period of complete desolation for Judah and Jerusalem: 

The Bible prophecy does not allow for the application of the 

70-year period to any time other than that between the desolation 

of Judah, accompanying Jerusalem’s destruction, and the return of 

the Jewish exiles to their homeland as a result of Cyrus’ decree. It 

clearly specifies that the 70 years would be years of devastation of the 

land of Judah. 1 

If no other understanding of the seventy-year period is allowed 

for by Bible prophecy, then a choice has to be made between the 

date determined by this application and the one established by at 

least seventeen lines of historical evidence. 

When a certain interpretation of a Biblical prophecy contradicts 

historical fact, this indicates that either the prophecy failed or 

1 Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 1 (Brooklyn. N.Y.: Watchtower Bible and Tract 

Society of New York, Inc., 1988), p. 463. 

191


the interpretation is wrong. It is true that a certain application 

sometimes looks very convincing, so much so that no other 

appears feasible. It seems to the reader to be given by the Bible 

itself. In such a case it may also seem to be a sound Christian 

position to discard the historical evidence and “just stick to what 

the Bible says.” 

When this position is taken, however, those taking it often 

overlook the fact that the fulfillment of a prophecy cannot be 

demonstrated aside from history, because only history can show 

whether, when, and how it was fulfilled. Actually, prophecy is not 

generally understood until after it has been fulfilled historically 

through events in time. Serious mistakes have sometimes been 

made by sincere Bible students because historical evidence contrary 

to a certain application or interpretation has been rejected. One 

example will be given below to illustrate this fact. 

History and time prophecies—a lesson 

Most commentators agree that Daniel’s prophecy of the “seventy 

weeks” (Daniel 9:24–27) refers to a period of 490 years. But 

various opinions have been held regarding the starting point of this 

period. Although it is stated at Daniel 9:25 that “from the going 

forth of [the] word to restore and to rebuild Jerusalem until 

Messiah [the] Leader, there will be seven weeks, also sixty-two 

weeks” (NW), different views are held regarding when and by 

whom this “word” was sent forth. 2 

If we “just stick to the Bible,” it seems to point to the Persian 

king Cyrus. At Isaiah 44:28 Jehovah “saith of Cyrus, He is my 

shepherd, and shall perform all my pleasure, even saying of 

Jerusalem, She shall be built; and of the temple, Thy foundation 

shall be laid” (ASV). And further, in chapter 45, verse 13: “I myself 

have roused up someone in righteousness [Cyrus], and all his ways 

I shall straighten out. He is the one that will build my city, and those of 

mine in exile he will let go, not for a price nor for bribery” (NW). 

Thus it would seem clear that according to the Bible itself the 

“word to restore and rebuild Jerusalem” was issued by Cyrus. This 

application, however, limits the period from Cyrus’ edict (Ezra 1:1– 

4) until Messiah to 483 years (”seven weeks, also sixty-two weeks”). 

If this period ended at the baptism of Christ, usually dated 

somewhere in the period 26–29 C.E., Cyrus’ first year as king of 

2 The principal interpretations are stated by Edward J. Young in The Prophecy of 

Daniel (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdman’s Publishing Co., 1949), pp. 192–195.

The Seventy Years for Babylon 193 

Babylon would have to be dated in the period 458–455 B.C.E. 

instead of 538, the historically acknowledged date. 

Contrary to all historical evidence, several Christian 

commentators in the past have chosen this application, and it is still 

adhered to by some expositors. The idea was popularized in the 

last century by Martin Anstey in his work The Romance of Bible 

Chronology, London 1913. 3 Dr. E. W. Bullinger (1837–1913) 

accepted the same position, as may be seen in Appendix 91 (pp. 

131–32) of his The Companion Bible. 

The reasoning underlying this unhistorical position is clearly 

demonstrated by one of its adherents, George Storrs, a Bible 

student from the 19th century and editor of the periodical Bible 

Examiner. In an article dealing with the seventy weeks, he states: 

In examining this point, we have nothing to do with profane 

chronology, or the chronology of the historians. The Bible must 

settle the question, and if profane chronology does not tally with 

it, we have a right to conclude such chronology is false, and not to 

be trusted. 4 

Storrs, like some other expositors before and after him, tried to 

cut off nearly 100 years from the Persian period, holding that a 

number of the Persian kings mentioned in “Ptolemy’s canon” (the 

Royal Canon) and other historical sources never existed! George 

Storrs surely was an honest and sincere Christian Bible student, but 

his (and others’) rejection of historical sources proved to be a grave 

mistake. 5 

3 Republished in 1973 by Kregel Publications under the title Chronology of the Old 

Testament. See p. 20 on the 490 years. Among more recent Bible commentators, 

Dr. David L. Cooper, founder of the Biblical Research Society and editor of the 

Biblical Research Monthly, held this same thesis in his The Seventy Weeks of Daniel 

(Los Angeles: Biblical Research Society, 1941). 

4 George Storrs (ed.), Bible Examiner (published in Brooklyn, N.Y.), April, 1863, p. 

120. 

5 The early Christian writer Tertullian (c. 160–c. 225 C.E.), in his Against the Jews, 

reckoned the 490 years from the first year of “Darius the Mede” (Dan. 9:1, 2) to the 

destruction of the second temple by the Romans in 70 C.E. This would date the 

first year of “Darius the Mede” to 421 B.C.E. instead of 538. Jewish rabbis in the 

Talmud (Seder Olam Rabbah) counted the 490 years from the destruction of the 

first temple by the Babylonians to the destruction of the second temple by the 

Romans, which would place the destruction of the first temple in 421 B.C.E. 

instead of 587. (R. T. Beckwith, “Daniel 9 and the Date of Messiah’s Coming in 

Essene, Hellenistic, Pharisaic, Zealot and Early Christian Computation,” in Revue 

de Qumran, Vol. 10:40, 1981, pp. 531–32, 539–40.) Although modern discoveries 

have made such applications wholly untenable, they still find adherents. See, for 

example, Rabbi Tovia Singer in Outreach Judaism. Study Guide to the “Let’s Get 

Biblical!” Tape Series, Live! (Mousey, NY: Outreach Judaism, 1995), pp. 40–41.


That the Persian kings mentioned in the Royal Canon really did 

exist has been proved beyond all doubt by archeological discoveries 

in modern times. 6 This is an instructive illustration of the necessity 

of considering the historical evidence in relation to biblical time 

prophecies. Although this special application of the seventy weeks 

seemed very biblical and very convincing, it has been refuted by 

historical facts and therefore cannot be correct. 

The same is also true of the application of the seventy-year 

prophecy made by the Watch Tower Society. Although on the 

surface it may seem to be supported by some passages in the Bible, 

it should be abandoned because it is incompatible with historical 

facts established by a multitude of modern discoveries. 

Is it possible, then, to find an application of the seventy years 

that accords with the historical evidence? It is, and a close 

examination of biblical texts dealing with the seventy years will 

demonstrate that there is no real conflict between the Bible and 

secular history in this matter. As will be shown below, it is the 

application made by the Watch Tower Society that conflicts, not only with 

secular history, but also with the Bible itself. 

There are seven scriptural texts referring to a period of seventy 

years which the Watch Tower Society applies to one and the same 

period: Jeremiah 25:10–12; 29:10; Daniel 9:1–2; 2 Chronicles 

6 During the years 1931–1940, reliefs, tombs, and inscriptions of the kings these 

expositors thought never existed were excavated in Persia. (Edwin M. Yamauchi, 

Persia and the Bible. Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1990, pp. 368–70.) That 

the Roya1 Canon puts these kings in the right order is also demonstrated by the 

inscription discovered on the walls of a palace of Artaxerxes III (358–337 B.C.E.), 

which reads: “Says Artaxerxes the great king, king of kings, king of countries, king 

of this earth: I (am) the son of Artaxerxes (II) the king: Artaxerxes (was) the son of 

Darius (II) the king; Darius (was) the son of Artaxerxes (I) the king; Artaxerxes 

(was) the son of Xerxes the king; Xerxes (was) the son of Darius (I) the king; Darius 

was the son of Hystaspes by name.” (E. F. Schmidt, Persepolis I. Chicago: 

University of Chicago Press, 1953, p. 224.) The absolute chronology of the later 

Persian kings thought not to have existed is today firmly established by numerous 

astronomical cuneiform texts extant from this period. 

In passing, the Watch Tower Society’s application of the 490 years is basically as 

historically unsound as are those of the others mentioned in this section. The 

dating of the 20th year of Artaxerxes I to 455 B.C.E. instead of 445 is in direct 

conflict with a number of historical sources, including several astronomical texts. 

When, therefore, The Watchtower of July 15, 1994, p. 30, claims that, “Accurate 

secular history establishes 455 B.C.E. as that year,” this is grossly misleading. (Cf. 

the similar misstatement in Awake!, June 22, 1995, p. 8.) No secular historian 

today would date the 20th year of Artaxerxes I to 455 B.C.E. (For a refutation of 

the idea, se the web essay referred to in footnote 14 on page 82 above.)


36:20–23; Zechariah 1:7–12; 7:1–7, and Isaiah 23:15–18. These will 

now be examined one by one in chronological order. 7 

A. JEREMIAH 25:10–12 

The original prediction is that of Jeremiah 25:10–12, which is dated 

to “the fourth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, the king of 

Judah, that is, the first year of Nebuchadrezzar the king of 

Babylon” (verse 1). Jehoiakim ruled for eleven years and was 

followed by his son Jehoiachin, who ruled for three months. 

Jehoiachin in turn was succeeded by his uncle Zedekiah, in whose 

eleventh year Jerusalem was desolated. Jeremiah’s prophecy, then, 

was given eighteen years prior to the destruction of Jerusalem. 

Jeremiah 25:10–12: 

”And I will destroy out of them the sound of exultation and the 

sound of rejoicing, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of 

the bride, the sound of the hand mill and the light of the lamp. 

And all this land [Judah) must become a devastated place, an 

object of astonishment, and these nations will have to serve the king of 

Babylon seventy years. And it must occur that when seventy years have 

been fulfilled I shall call to account against the king of Babylon and against 

that nation,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “their error, even against 

the land of the Chaldeans, and I will make it desolate wastes to 

time indefinite.” (NW) 8 

7 The seventy years for Tyre at Isaiah 23:15–18 will not be discussed here, as it 

cannot be proved that they refer to the period of Neo-Babylonian supremacy. Some 

scholars, in fact, apply it to circa 700–630 B.C.E., when Tyre was controlled by 

Assyria. See, for example, Dr. Seth Erlandsson, The Burden of Babylon (= 

Coniectanea Biblica. Old Testament Series 4) (Lund, Sweden: CWK Gleerup, 1970), 

pp. 97–102. 

8 The quotation is from The New World Translation (NW), which is based on the 

Hebrew Masoretic text (MT). The Greek Septuagint version (LXX) says: “and they 

will serve among the nations,” instead of: “and these nations wil1 have to serve the 

king of Babylon.” In Jeremiah 25:1–12 of the LXX, for some unknown reason, all 

references to Babylon and king Nebuchadnezzar are omitted. There are many 

differences between Jer-MT and Jer-LXX. Jer-LXX is about one-seventh shorter 

than Jer-MT, which contains 3,097 more words than Jer-LXX. A number of 

modem scholars hold that Jer-LXX was translated from a Hebrew text that was 

earlier than the text tradition represented by Jer-MT, arguing that Jer-MT 

represents a later revision and expansion of the original text, either by Jeremiah 

himself, his scribe Baruch, or some later editor(s). Thus, with respect to 

Jeremiah’s prediction that the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar would attack and 

destroy the kingdom of Judah, these scholars often find it difficult to believe that 

Jeremiah was able to give such concrete and specific forecasts. They find it easier 

to accept the more general and vague wordings of the Jer-LXX as representing the 

original prediction, with all references to Babylon and king Nebuchadnezzar being 

left out. However, some of the scholars who have adopted this view admit that it 

creates problems. If the origina1 prophecy of Jeremiah 25:1–12, which was given 

in the fourth year of [continued on next page]


Three things are predicted in this prophecy: 

(1) The land of Judah would become a “devastated place”. 

(2) ”These nations” would “serve the king of Babylon 

seventy years”. 

(3) When the seventy years had been “fulfilled” God would 

“call to account against the king of Babylon and against 

that nation . . . their error, even against” the land of the 

Chaldeans. 

What does this passage really tell us about the “seventy years”? 

A-1: Desolation or servitude—which? 

Although it is predicted in the passage that the land of Judah would 

be a devastated place, it should be noted that this “devastation” is 

not equated with, or linked with, the period of the seventy years. 

All that is clearly and unambiguously stated in the text is that 

“these nations will have to serve the king of Babylon seventy years” 

The phrase “these nations” is a reference back to verse 9, in which 

it is predicted that Nebuchadnezzar would come against “this land 

[that is, Judah] and its inhabitants, and also against all these nations 

round about.” 

The seventy years, then, should be understood to mean years of 

servitude for these nations. This conclusion is so obvious that the 

Watch Tower Society, at the head of page 826 of its large-print 

Jehoiakim and was presented to the king a few months later (Jeremiah 36:1–32), did not 

contain any references to Babylon and king Nebuchadnezzar, how then could 

Jehoiakim, after having listened to and burned up the roll with the prophecy, ask 

Jeremiah: “Why is it that you have written on it, saying: The king of Babylon will come 

without fail and will certainly bring this land to ruin and cause man and beast to 

cease from it?’ “ (Jeremiah 36:29, NW) As this same question is found both in Jer-MT 

and Jer-LXX, the original prophecy must have explicitly mentioned the king of Babylon. 

Professor Norman K. Gottwald cites this verse and says: “If the prophet had not 

somewhere in his scroll openly identified Babylon as the invader, the sharp retort of the 

king is difficult to explain.” (N. K. Gottwald, All the Kingdoms of the Earth. New York, 

Evanston, and London: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1964, p. 251.) This strongly 

indicates that Jer-MT might very well represent the original text here. 

It should be kept in mind that LXX is a translation made hundreds of years after the 

time of Jeremiah from a Hebrew text that is now lost, and, as the editors of Bagster’s 

The Septuagint Version of the Old Testament point out in the “Introduction,” some of 

the translators of the LXX were not competent to their task and often inserted their 

own interpretations and traditions. Most scholars agree with this observation. The 

Watch Tower Society, too, emphasizes that “the Greek translation of this book 

[Jeremiah] is defective, but that does not lessen the reliability of the Hebrew text.”— 

Insight an the Scriptures, Vol. 2, 1988, p. 32. 

For a thorough defense of the superiority of the MT text of Jeremiah, see Dr. Sven 

Soderlund, The Greek Text of Jeremiah (= Journal for the Study of the Old 

Testament, Supplement Series 47), Sheffield, England: JSOT Press, 1985.


edition of the New World Translation (1971 ed.), automatically 

describes the seventy years as “70 years’ servitude due.” 9 

Yet, in their discussions of this text, Watchtower writers never 

point out that Jeremiah spoke of seventy years of servitude, or that 

this servitude related to the nations surrounding Judah. They try always 

to give the impression that the seventy years referred to Judah, and 

Judah only, and they always describe the seventy years as a period 

in which Judah suffered complete desolation, “without an inhabitant.” 10 

This they reckon as having happened from the destruction of 

Jerusalem and its temple. But their application is in direct conflict 

with the exact wording of Jeremiah’s prediction, and it can be 

upheld only by ignoring what the text actually says. 

”Servitude” here should not be taken to mean the same thing as 

desolation and exile. For the nations surrounding Judah the 

9 As the attention was drawn to this heading in the original version of the present 

work (sent to the Watchtower headquarters in 1977), and also in the published 

edition of 1983, it was no surprise to find that it had been changed in the 1984 

large-print edition of NW. The heading (p. 965) now reads: “70 years’ exile due.” 

10 The Hebrew word for “desolation,” chorbáh is also used in verse 18, where 

Jerusalem and the cities of Judah are stated to become “a desolation (chorbáh), . . . 

as it is today.” As Dr. J. A. Thompson remarks, “The phrase as it is today suggests 

that at the time of writing some aspects of this judgment, at 1east, were apparent.” 

(The Book of Jeremiah, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1980, p. 516) The prophecy was 

uttered and written down in the fourth year of Jehoiakim . . . that is, the first year 

of Nebuchadnezzar.” (Jer. 25:1; 36:1–4) But as that scroll was burned by 

Jehoiakim some months later, in the ninth month of his fifth year (36:9–25), 

another scroll had to be written. (36:32) At that time Nebuchadnezzar’s armies had 

already invaded and ravaged the land of Judah. At the time of writing, therefore, 

the phrase “as it is today” was probably added as a result of this desolation. 

That the word chorbáh does not necessarily imply a state of total desolation 

“without an inhabitant” can be seen from other texts which use the word, for 

example Ezekiel 33:24, 27 (”the inhabitants of these devastated places”) and at 

Nehemiah 2:17. During Nehemiah’s time Jerusalem was inhabited, yet the city is 

said to be “devastated (chorbáh).” The phrase “desolate waste, without an 

inhabitant” is found at Jeremiah 9:11 and 34:22. Although it refers to Jerusalem 

and the cities of Judah it is nowhere equated with the period of seventy years. As 

pointed out by Professor Arthur Jeffrey in the Interpreter’s Bible (Vol. 6, p. 485), 

chorbáh is ‘often employed to describe the state of a devastated land after the 

armies of an enemy have passed (Leviticus 26:31, 33; Isaiah 49:19; Jeremiah 

44:22; Ezekiel 36:34; Malachi 1:4; 1 Maccabees 1:39).” It would not be inaccurate, 

therefore, to talk of Judah as chorbáh eighteen years prior to its depopulation, if 

the land had been ravaged by the army of an enemy at that time. Inscriptions from 

Assyria and Babylonia show that, in order to break the power and morale of a 

rebel quickly, the imperial army would try to ruin the economic potential “by 

destroying unfortified settlements, cutting down plantations and devastating 

fields” — Israel Eph’al, “On Warfare and Military Control in the Ancient Near 

Eastern Empires,” in H. Tadmor & M. Weinfield (eds.), History, Historiography and 

1nterpretatian (Jerusalem: The Magnes Press, 1984), p. 97.


servitude first of all meant vassalage. 11 Although Judah, too, was 

subdued by Babylon, it time and again revolted and attempted to 

throw off the Babylonian yoke, which brought wave after wave of 

devastating military ravages and deportations until the country was 

at last desolated and depopulated after the destruction of Jerusalem 

in 587 B.C.E. That such a fate was not the same thing as servitude, 

but would come as a punishment upon any nation that refused to 

serve the king of Babylon, had been clearly predicted by Jeremiah, at 

chapter 27, verses 7, 8, and 11: 

”And all the nations must serve even him [Nebuchadnezzar] 

and his son and his grandson until the time even of his own land 

comes, and many nations and great kings must exploit him as a 

servant. 

”And it must occur that the nation and the kingdom that will not serve 

him, even Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon; and the one that 

will not put its neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon, with the 

sword and with the famine and with the pestilence I shall turn my attention 

upon that nation,” is the utterance of Jehovah, “until I have finished 

them off by his hand.” 

”And as for the nation that will bring its neck under the yoke of the king 

of Babylon and actually serve him, I will also let it rest upon its ground,” is 

the utterance of Jehovah, “and it will certainly cultivate it and dwell in 

it.” (NW) 

From these verses it is very clear what it meant to a nation to 

serve the king of Babylon. It meant to accept the yoke of Babylon as 

a vassal and by that be spared from desolation and deportation. 

The servitude, therefore, was the very opposite of revolt, desolation, 

deportation, and exile. 12 That is why Jeremiah warned the people 

11 As brought out by any Hebrew dictionary , the Hebrew verb ‘abad, “work, serve,” 

could also mean to serve as a subject or vassal, e.g. by paying tribute. The 

corresponding noun ‘ebed, “slave, servant,” is often used of vassal states or 

tributary nations. In fact, the technical term for “vassal” in Hebrew was precisely 

‘ebed. —See Dr. Jonas C. Greenfield, “Some aspects of Treaty Terminology in the 

Bible,” Fourth World Congress of Jewish Studies: Papers, Vol. I, 1967, pp. 117–119; 

also Dr. Ziony Zevit, “The Use of ‘ebed as a Diplomatic Term in Jeremiah,” Journal 

of Biblical Literature, Vol. 88, 1969, pp. 74–77. 

12 The difference is noted by Dr. John Hill in his analysis of Jeremiah 25:10, 11: “In 

vv. 10–11 there is a twofold elaboration of the punishment announced in v. 9. The 

first part of the elaboration is in vv. 10–11a, which refers to the subjugation and 

devastation of Judah. The second part is in v. 11b which refers to the subjugation 

of Judah’s neighbours. Vv. 10–11 then distinguishes the fate of Judah from that of 

its neighbours, which is that of subjugation. Judah’s fate is to suffer the 

devastation of its land.”—J. Hill, Friend or Foe? The Figure of Babylon in the Book of 

Jeremiah MT (Brill:Leiden etc., 1999, p. 110, note 42.


against attempting to throw off the Babylonian yoke and 

admonished them: “Serve the king of Babylon and keep on living. 

Why should this city become a devastated place?” —Jeremiah 

27:17, NW. 

Thus, the nations that accepted the Babylonian yoke would serve 

the king of Babylon seventy years. But the nations that refused to 

serve the Babylonian king would become devastated. This fate at last 

befell Judah after about eighteen years of servitude, interrupted by 

repeated rebellions. The seventy years of servitude foretold by 

Jeremiah, therefore, did not apply to Judah as a nation, but only to 

the nations who submitted to the king of Babylon. As Judah 

refused to submit, it had to get the punishment for this―desolation 

and exile―exactly as had been predicted at Jeremiah 25:11. Of 

course, the exiled Jews also had to perform various kinds of 

“service” in Babylonia. This was not the service of a vassal state, 

however, but the service of captured and deported slaves! 13 

A-2: When would the seventy years end? 

The prediction that “these nations will have to serve the king of 

Babylon seventy years” (Jeremiah 25:11) implies that there would 

be a change in Babylon’s position of supremacy at the end of the 

seventy-year period. This change is described in verse 12 of 

Jeremiah 25: 

”And it must occur that when seventy years have been fulfilled I shall 

call to account against the king of Babylon and against that nation,” 

is the utterance of Jehovah, “their error, even against the land of 

the Chaldeans, and I will make it desolate wastes to time 

indefinite.” (NW) 

All historians, and also the Watch Tower Society, agree that the 

Neo-Babylonian empire ended in 539 B.C.E. On October 12 

(Julian calendar) that year the city of Babylon was captured by the 

13 Other nations, too, who refused to accept the Babylonian yoke, were desolated, and 

captives were brought to Babylon. For example, one of the Philistine city-states, 

probably Ashkelon (the name is only partly legible), was “plundered and sacked” 

and “turned . . . into a ruin heap,” according to the Babylonian Chronicle (B. M. 

21946). This destruction, predicted by Jeremiah at Jeremiah 47:5–7, took place in 

the month Kislimu (9th month) of the first year of Nebuchadnezzar according to 

the chronicle, that is, in November, or December, 604 B.C.E. (A. K. Grayson, 

Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles, Locust Valley, N.Y.: J.J. Augustin Publisher, 

1975, p. 100.) That Ashkelon was mined is now confirmed by excavations. In 1992, 

Lawrence E. Stager uncovered at Ashkelon the archaeological evidence for this 

Babylonian destruction.— See L. E. Stager, “The Fury of Babylon: Ashkelon and 

the Archaeology of Destruction,” Biblical Archaeology Review, Vol. 22:1 (1996), pp. 

56–69, 76–77.


armies of the Persian king Cyrus. Belshazzar, the son of king 

Nabonidus, was killed, according to the book of Daniel, chapter 5, 

verse 30. Nabonidus himself was taken prisoner and exiled to 

Carmania in the east, where he spent the rest of his life as governor 

of that province, according to Berossus. 14 

The year in which Jehovah would “call to account against the 

king of Babylon and against that nation . . . their error, even against 

the land of the Chaldeans” therefore was evidently 539 B.C.E. At 

that time the seventy years had “been fulfilled,” according to 

Jeremiah’s prophecy. The Persian conquest of Babylonia in 539 

B.C.E. definitely put an end to the Babylonian supremacy over the 

nations who had served as its vassals up to that year. After that year 

it was impossible to “serve the king of Babylon” in any sense, 

either as vassals or as exiled captives in Babylonia. From that year 

onward these people had to serve, not the king of Babylon, but the 

king of Persia. 15 The seventy years of servitude, therefore, definitely 

ended in 539 B.C.E., not later. 

Note, then, that Jeremiah’s prophecy is clearly incompatible with 

the view that the seventy years referred to the period of the desolation 

of Judah and Jerusalem. Why? Because this desolation did not end in 

539 B.C.E. but later, when a remnant of the Jewish exiles had 

returned to Judah as a result of Cyrus’ edict. (Ezra 1:13:1) 

According to the Watch Tower Society this took place two years after 

the fall of Babylon, or in 537 B.C.E. In that year, they hold, the 

seventy years ended. But how did Jehovah “call to account against the 

king of Babylon and against that nation . . . their error” in 537 B.C.E., 

two years after his dethronement and the fall of Babylon? A 

solution to this problem has never been presented in the 

publications of the Watch Tower Society. 

A-3: The historical setting of the seventy-year prophecy 

If the seventy years ended in 539 B.C.E., when did they begin? 

Clearly, they cannot be counted from the year of the desolation of 

Jerusalem. The period from the established date of 587 B.C.E. to 

539 was only forty-eight years. However, as the seventy years have 

been shown above to refer to the period of subservience to Babylon, 

14 See the comments of Paul-Alain Beaulieu in The Reign of Nabonidus, King of 

Babylon, 556–539 B.C. (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1989), 

pp. 230, 231 

15 In accordance with this, 2 Chron. 36:20 states that the exiled Jews “came to be 

servants to him [Nebuchadnezzar] and his sons until the royalty of Persia began to 

reign” (NW), that is, until the autumn of 539 B.C.E., but no longer.


not to Jerusalem’s desolation , the right question to be asked is: 

When did the period of servitude begin? 

First of all, it is important to establish the historical background 

against which this prophecy was given. As pointed out earlier, it 

was given eighteen years before the destruction of Jerusalem and its 

temple, “in the fourth year of Jehoiakim” (Jeremiah 25:1), that is, in 

605 B.C.E. 

That year saw a very important event take place, with 

momentous consequences to Judah and its neighbours. It was the 

year of the well known battle of Carchemish (on the Euphrates river in 

northern Syria), when Nebuchadnezzar decisively defeated the 

Egyptian Pharaoh Necho and his military force. This important 

victory opened the way for the Babylonian king to the areas in the 

west, Syria and Palestine, which for a few years previous (609–605 

B.C.E.) had been controlled by Egypt. This famous battle is also 

referred to, and dated, at Jeremiah 46:2: 

For Egypt, concerning the military force of Pharaoh Necho the 

king of Egypt, who happened to be by the river Euphrates at 

Carchemish, whom Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon defeated 

in the fourth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, the king of Judah. 

(NW) 

The prophecy of the seventy years was thus given at a crucial 

point of time. Could it be that Judah and her neighbours were 

made vassals to and began to serve the king of Babylon in that 

year? Research does find evidence to show that Judah and a 

number of the surrounding nations began to be made subservient to the 

king of Babylon very soon after the battle of Carchemish, in the fourth year of 

Jehoiakim and thereafter. 

In 1956 Professor D. J. Wiseman published a translation of the 

Babylonian Chronicle B.M. 21946, covering the period from the 

last (21st) year of Nabopolassar up to and including the tenth year 

of his son and successor, Nebuchadnezzar. 16 This tablet 

commences with a concise description of the battle at Carchemish 

and the subsequent events. The opening portion is quoted here in 

full because of its importance for our examination: 17 

16 D. J. Wiseman, Chronicles of the Chaldean Kings (London: The Trustees of the 

British Museum, 1961), pp. 66–75. 

17 The quotations in the following are taken from A. K. Grayson’s more recent 

translation of the chronicles in his Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles (Locust 

Valley, N.Y.: J. J. Augustin Publisher, 1975), pp. 99, 100.


Nebuchadnezzar II (604–562 B.C.E.) 

The only portrait of Nebuchadnezzar II extant is found on this 

cameo, now in the Berlin Museum. It was probably engraved by a 

Greek in the service of the great king. The surrounding cuneiform 

inscription reads: "To Marduk his lord, Nebuchadnezzar, King of 

Babylon, for his life this made." The picture of the cameo, which 

has the inventory number VA 1628, is used courtesy of the 

Vorderasiatisches Museum in Berlin. 

[The twenty-first year]: The king of Akkad stayed home (while) 

Nebuchadnezzar (II), his eldest son (and) the crown prince, 

mustered [the army of Akkad]. He took his army’s lead and 

marched to Carchemish which is on the bank of the Euphrates. He 

crossed the river [to encounter the army of Egypt] which was encamped 

at Carchemish. [...] They did battle together. The army of Egypt 

retreated before him. He inflicted a [defeat] upon them (and) 

finished them off completely. In the district of Hamath the army 

of Akkad overtook the remainder of the army of [Egypt which]


managed to escape [from] the defeat and which was not overcome. 

They (the army of Akkad) inflicted a defeat upon them (so that) a 

single (Egyptian) man [did not return] home. At that time 

Nebuchadnezzar (II) conquered all of Ha[ma]th. 18 

For twenty-one years Nabopolassar ruled Babylon. On the eighth 

day of the month Ab he died. In the month Elul Nebuchadnezzar 

(II) returned to Babylon and on the first day of the month Elul he 

ascended the royal throne in Babylon. 19 

In (his) accession-year Nebuchadnezzar (II) returned to Hattu. 

Until the month Shebat he marched about victoriously in Hattu. In 

the month Shebat he took the vast booty of Hattu to Babylon. 

. . . 

The first year of Nebuchadnezzar (II): In the month Sivan he 

mustered his army and marched to Hattu. Until the month Kislev 

he marched about victoriously in Hattu. All the kings of Hattu came 

into his presence and he received their vast tribute. 

The chronicle makes evident the far-reaching consequences of 

Egypt’s defeat at Carchemish. Immediately after the battle in the 

summer of 605 B.C.E., Nebuchadnezzar began to take over the 

western areas in vassalage to Egypt, using Riblah in Hamath in 

Syria as his military base. 

The terrifying annihilation of the whole Egyptian army at 

Carchemish and in Hamath paved the way for a rapid occupation 

of the whole region by the Babylonians, and they do not seem to 

have met much resistance. During this victorious campaign 

Nebuchadnezzar learned that his father Nabopolassar had died, so 

he had to return to Babylon to secure the throne, evidently leaving 

his army in Hattu to continue the operations there. 

As Wiseman points out, Hattu was a geographical term that at 

that time denoted approximately Syria-Lebanon. As argued by Dr. 

18 Hamath was a district at the river Orontes in Syria where Pharaoh Nechoh, at a 

place called Riblah, had established the Egyptian headquarters. After the defeat of 

the Egyptian army, Nebuchadnezzar chose the same site as the base for his 

operations in the west.—See 2 Kings 23:31–35; 25:6, 20–21; Jeremiah 39:5–7; 

52:9–27. 

19 Nabopolassar’s death on 8 Abu corresponds to August 16, 605 B.C.E. (Julian 

calendar). Nebuchadnezzar ascended the throne on Ululu 1 (September 7, 605). 

The battle of Carchemish in May or June, 605, therefore, took place in the same 

year as his accession-year. His first regnal year began next spring, on Nisanu 1, 

604 B.C.E. The reason why the Bible dates the battle to the first year of 

Nebuchadnezzar (cf. Jer. 46:2 and 25:1) seems to be that the Jewish kings applied 

the nonaccession-year system, in which the accession-year was counted as the 

first year. See the Appendix for chapter two, “Methods of reckoning regnal years.”


J. D. Hawkins in Reallexikon der Assyriologie, it also, ‘in an extended 

sense,’ included Palestine and Phoenicia. 20 

After his enthronement in Babylon (on September 7, 605), 

Nebuchadnezzar quickly went back to the Hattu territory, where he 

“marched about victoriously” for some months until “the month 

Shebat” (the eleventh month, corresponding to February, 604 

B.C.E.). Evidently most of the countries in the west had now been 

brought under Babylonian control, and he could, therefore, take a 

heavy tribute to Babylon, which also, as will be shown immediately, 

included prisoners from Judah and adjacent countries. 

Early in his first regnal year (in June, 604 B.C.E.) 

Nebuchadnezzar led another campaign to Hattu to maintain his 

rule over the conquered territories. Similar campaigns are also 

recorded for the following years. Clearly, the nations in the Hattu 

area became vassals to Babylon very soon after the battle at 

Carchemish. The seventy years of servitude had evidently begun to 

run their course. 

A-4: The Babylonian occupation of Hattu and Daniel 1:1–6 

Not only did Nebuchadnezzar bring a number of the nations 

surrounding Judah under his dominion in 605 B.C.E., but he also 

laid siege to Jerusalem and brought some Jewish captives to 

Babylon in that very year. This is clear from Daniel 1:1–6. 

In recording the event, Daniel states that it occurred “in the third 

year of the kingship of Jehoiakim” Yet the siege and deportation 

apparently followed the battle at Carchemish which Jeremiah places 

“in the fourth year of Jehoiakim.” (Jeremiah 46:2) This seeming 

contradiction has caused much debate, and different solutions have 

been proposed in order to resolve the difficulty. But if, as is 

pointed out in note 19, the different methods of reckoning regnal 

years in Judah and Babylon are taken into consideration, the whole 

matter is easily cleared up. Daniel, as a Jewish exile living in 

Babylon and as an official at the Babylonian court, quite naturally 

conformed to the Babylonian regnal year system and adopted the 

accession-year method and even did so when referring to Jewish 

20 D. J. Wiseman, Nebuchadrezzar and Babylon, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 

1985, p. 18; Reallexikon der Assyriologie, Vol. 4 [ed. D. O. Edzard], 1972–1975, pp. 

154–56. Reasonably, Jehoiakim must have been one of “all the kings of Hattu” 

paying tribute to Nebuchadnezzar at this time. Of this, J. P. Hyatt says: “It was 

probably in 605, or in the following year, that Jehoiakim submitted to the 

Babylonian king, as recorded in II Kings 24:1; . . . and II Kings 24:7 says that ‘the 

king of Babylon took all that belonged to the king of Egypt from the Brook of Egypt 

to the River Euphrates.’ “—J. P. Hyatt, “New Light on Nebuchadnezzar and Judean 

History,” in Journal of Biblical Literature, 75 (1956), p. 280.


Judah and the surrounding nations 

kings. This method of counting would make Jehoiakim’s fourth 

year his third, in accordance with the accession-year system. 

Daniel 1:2 states that at this time “Nebuchadnezzar king of 

Babylon came to Jerusalem and besieged it. And the Lord gave 

Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand” (NASB). This does not 

necessarily imply that the city was taken and Jehoiakim brought 

captive to Babylon. To be given into someone’s hand may simply 

mean to be forced into submission. (Compare Judges 3:10; 

Jeremiah 27:6, 7, and similar texts.) The indication is that Jehoiakim 

capitulated and became a tributary to the king of Babylon. He 

evidently paid a tribute to Nebuchadnezzar at this time in the form 

of “some of the vessels of the house of God”—Daniel 1:2. 

As this clearly points to a beginning of the servitude early in the 

reign of Jehoiakim, the Watch Tower Society has advanced several 

arguments against a natural and direct reading of this text. Thus it 

holds that the “third year” should be understood as the third year of 

Jehoiakim’s vassalage to Nebuchadnezzar, which, it is argued, was his


eleventh and last regnal year (which partly overlapped the seventh year of 

Nebuchadnezzar, or his eighth year in the nonaccession-year 

system). 

But this explanation directly contradicts Daniel 2:1, which shows 

Daniel at the court of Nebuchadnezzar and interpreting his dream 

of the image already in the “second year” of this king. If Daniel 

was brought to Babylon in Nebuchadnezzar’s seventh year, how 

could he be there interpreting his dreams in his second year? So, to 

save their interpretation, this text, too, had to be changed and made 

to say something else besides what it clearly says. Two different 

explanations have been offered through the years, the last one 

being that in this verse Daniel reckons Nebuchadnezzar’s years 

from the destruction of Jerusalem in his eighteenth year. 

Nebuchadnezzar’s second year, then, should be understood as his 

nineteenth year (the twentieth year in the nonaccession-year system)! 

Thus, once again we find that the application of the seventy 

years held to by the Watch Tower Society contradicts the Bible, 

this time Daniel 1:1–2 and 2:1. In order to uphold its theory, it is 

forced to reject the easiest and most direct reading of these texts? 21 

That some Jewish captives had already been brought to Babylon 

in the year of Nebuchadnezzar’s accession is also confirmed by 

Berossus in his Babylonian history written in the third century 

B.C.E. His account of the events of this year reads as follows: 

Nabopalassaros, his father, heard that the satrap who had been 

posted to Egypt, Coele Syria, and Phoenicia, had become a rebel. 

No longer himself equal to the task, he entrusted a portion of his 

army to his son Nabouchodonosoros, who was still in the prime of 

life, and sent him against the rebel. Nabouchodonosoros drew up 

his force in battle order and engaged the rebel. He defeated him 

and subjected the country to the rule of the Babylonians again. At 

this very time Nabopalassaros , his father fell ill and died in the city 

of the Babylonians after having been king for twenty-one years. 

Nabouchodonosoros learned of his father’s death shortly 

thereafter. After he arranged affairs in Egypt and the remaining 

territory, he ordered some of his friends to bring the Jewish, 

Phoenician, Syrian, and Egyptian prisoners together with the bulk of the army 

and the rest of the booty to Babylonia. He himself set out with a few 

companions and reached Babylon by crossing the desert. 22 

21 For additional comments on Daniel 1:1, 2 and 2:1, see the Appendix for Chapter 5. 

22 Stanley Mayer Burstein, The Babyloniaca of Berossus (Malibu: Undena 

Publications, 1978), pp. 26, 27.


Thus Berossus gives support to Daniel’s statement that Jewish 

captives were brought to Babylon in the year of Nebuchadnezzar’s 

accession. This confirmation of Daniel 1:1 is important because, as 

was shown in Chapter three, Berossus derived his information 

from the Babylonian chronicles, or sources close to those 

documents, originally written during the Neo-Babylonian era 

itself. 23 

A-5: The servitude as reflected in Jeremiah, chapters 27, 

28, and 35 

That the servitude of “these nations” (Jer. 25:11) began long 

before the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 B.C.E. is also clear from 

Jeremiah, chapters 27, 28, and 35. 

In chapter 27, as discussed earlier, Jeremiah urges Zedekiah not 

to revolt, but to bring his neck under the yoke of the king of 

Babylon and serve him. The context shows this occurred in the 

fourth year of Zedekiah, that is, in 595/94 B.C.E. 24 The 

background of this “word . . . from Jehovah” was, according to 

verse 2, that messengers had come to Zedekiah from Edom, Moab, 

Ammon, Tyre, and Sidon, apparently in order to enlist him in an 

extensive revolt against the Babylonian yoke. Obviously all these 

nations were vassals to Babylon at this time, as was Judah. 

The revolt plans aroused unfounded hopes and enthusiasm 

among the people, and the prophet Hananiah even foretold that 

the Babylonian yoke would be broken within two years: 

23 Berossus’ account of these events has been the subject of criticism, but was 

accepted by historians such as Hugo Winkler, Edgar Goodspeed, James H. 

Breasted and Friedrich Delitzsch. See “The Third Year of Jehoiakim,” by Albertus 

Pieters, in From the Pyramids to Paul, edited by Lewis Gaston Leary (New York: 

Thomas Nelson and Sons, 1935), p. 191. The discovery of the Babylonian 

Chronicle B.M. 21946 has given additional support to Berossus’ description of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s conquests after the battle at Carchemish. D. J. Wiseman, the 

first translator of this chronicle, says that Berossus’ account of these events “rings 

true” (The Cambridge Ancient History, Vol. III:2, J. Boardman et al [eds.], 

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991, pp. 230–231.) On Berossus’ 

description of Pharaoh Necho as a rebellious satrap Dr. Menahem Stem says: 

“From the point of view of those who regarded the neo-Babylonian empire as a 

continuation of the Assyrian, the conquest of Coele-Syria and Phoenicia by the 

Egyptian ruler might be interpreted as the rape of Babylonian territory.”—M. Stem, 

Greek and Latin Authors on Jews and Judaism, Vol. 1 (Jerusalem 1974), p.59. 

24 In verse 1 of chapter 27 this message is dated to the beginning of the reign of 

“Jehoiakim,” but a comparison with verses 3 and 12 shows that the original 

reading most probably was “Zedekiah.” This is also confirmed by the next chapter, 

Jeremiah 28, dated in verse 1 to “the same year,” which is explained to be “in the 

beginning of the reign of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the fourth year” (NASB), that 

is, in 595/94 B.C.E.


This is what Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel, has said, “I 

will break the yoke of the king of Babylon. Within two full years 

more I am bringing back to this place all the utensils of the house 

of Jehovah that Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon took from 

this place that he might bring them to Babylon. “—Jeremiah 28:2, 

3, NW. 25 

This prophecy, of course, presupposed that the Babylonian yoke 

had already been put on the neck of the nations. That is why 

Hananiah could take the yoke bar from the neck of Jeremiah, break 

it and say: “This is what Jehovah has said, ‘Just like this I shall 

break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon within two 

full years more from off the neck of all the nations.’ “ (Jeremiah 28: 10, 

11) So, in the fourth year of Zedekiah the Babylonian yoke lay on 

“the neck of all the nations.” The servitude was a hard felt reality 

for “all these nations” at that time, and had evidently been so for a 

number of years. 

The Babylonian invasion of Judah soon after the battle at 

Carchemish is also reflected in Jeremiah chapter 35, dated in “the 

days of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah.” (verse 1) The Rechabites, 

who normally dwelt in tents in obedience to the command of their 

forefather, Jehonadab the son of Rechab, lived in Jerusalem at that 

time. Why? They explained to Jeremiah: 

But it came about when Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon came up 

against the land that we began to say, “Come, and let us enter into 

Jerusalem because of the military force of the Chaldeans and 

because of the military force of the Syrians, and let us dwell in 

Jerusalem.”— Jeremiah 35:11, NW. 

Thus, some time earlier in the reign of Jehoiakim, the 

Babylonian army had invaded the territory of Judah, forcing the 

Rechabites to seek refuge inside the walls of Jerusalem. Either this 

invasion was the one described in Daniel 1:1–2, or the one that 

took place in the following year, when, according to the Babylonian 

chronicle, “all the kings of Hattu” presented their tribute to the 

Babylonian king as a sign of their vassalage. 

That Judah became a vassal of Babylon early in the reign of 

Jehoiakim is clearly stated in 2 Kings 24:1, which says that in the 

25 The reason for the widespread revolt plans in this year could have been the 

rebellion in Nebuchadnezzar’s own army in Babylonia, in the tenth year of his 

reign (= 595/94 B.C.E.) according to the Babylonian Chronicle B.M. 21946.—A. K. 

Grayson, ABC (see note 17 above), p. 102. Nebuchadnezzar’s tenth year partly 

overlapped Zedekiah’s fourth year. See the remarks on this revolt in the last 

section of the Appendix: “Chronological tables covering the seventy years.”


days of Jehoiakim “Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon came up, 

and so Jehoiakim became his servant for three years. However, he 

turned back and rebelled against him.” (NW) This rebellion caused 

the king of Babylon “to send against him marauder bands of 

Chaldeans and marauder bands of Syrians and marauder bands of 

Moabites and marauder bands of the sons of Ammon [these 

nations were now obviously under the control of the king of 

Babylon], and he kept sending them against Judah to destroy it.” 

(Verse 2, NW) 

It has been demonstrated above that Jeremiah’s prediction of 

the seventy years in Jeremiah 25:10–12 did not refer to a period of 

complete desolation of Jerusalem, but a period of servitude, not for 

Judah, but for “these nations,” that is, the nations surrounding 

Judah. 

It was further shown that the Bible and secular historical 

sources, such as the Babylonian chronicle and Berossus, all agree 

that the servitude for these nations began long before the 

destruction of Jerusalem in 587 B.C.E. The Babylonian chronicle 

B.M. 21946 shows that Nebuchadnezzar started to conquer these 

areas immediately after the battle at Carchemish in 605 B.C.E. 

Daniel 1:1–6 relates that Nebuchadnezzar, in the same year, laid 

siege to Jerusalem and brought Jewish captives to Babylon. 

Berossus confirms Daniel 1:1–6 with respect to this first 

deportation (which probably was rather small). Jeremiah, chapters 

27, 28, and 35 all show that Judah and the surrounding nations 

were vassals to Babylon as early as in the reign of Jehoiakim, and 

this is also apparent from 2 Kings 24:1–2. For Judah and a number 

of the surrounding nations, the servitude evidently began in the 

same year Jeremiah uttered his prophecy, that is in 605 B.C.E. 

The application of the seventy years made by the Watch Tower 

Society, on the other hand, is in direct conflict with the prophecy 

of Jeremiah. It applies the seventy years to Judah only, ignoring the 

fact that Jeremiah’s prophecy refers to a period of servitude for a 

number of nations, not a state of complete desolation “without an 

inhabitant” of Jerusalem and Judah. 

The next text which deals with the seventy years will be seen to 

be in direct conflict with the Society’s application as well. 

B: JEREMIAH 29:10 

Jeremiah’s second reference to the seventy years is given in a letter 

that Jeremiah sent from Jerusalem to the Jews who had been


deported to Babylon, not only those who had been brought there 

in the first deportation in 605 B.C.E., but also those “whom 

Nebuchadnezzar had carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon, 

after Jeconiah the king [= Jehoiachin; compare 2 Kings 24:10–15] and 

the lady and the court officials, the princes of Judah and Jerusalem, and the 

craftsmen and the builders of bulwarks had gone forth from Jerusalem.” — 

Jeremiah 29:1–2, NW. 

This would date the prophecy to the reign of Zedekiah (verse 3) 

and probably about the same time as the preceding chapter, that is, 

to the fourth year of Zedekiah, 595/94 B.C.E.—Jeremiah 28:1. 

The background situation seems to have been the same in both 

chapters: The widespread revolt plans which stirred up hopes of 

liberation from the Babylonian yoke in Judah and the surrounding 

nations also reached the exiles at Babylon. As in Judah, false 

prophets arose among the Jews at Babylon and promised release in 

a short time. (Jeremiah 29:8–9) This was the reason why at this 

time, several years prior to the destruction of Jerusalem, Jeremiah sent a 

letter to these exiles at Babylon, calling their attention to the 

prophecy of the seventy years: 

Jeremiah 29:8–10: 

For this is what Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel, has said: 

“Let not YOUR prophets who are in among YOU and YOUR 

practicers of divination deceive YOU, and do not YOU listen to 

their dreams that they are dreaming. For it is in falsehood that they 

are prophesying to YOU in my name. I have not sent them,” is the 

utterance of Jehovah. For this is what Jehovah has said, “In accord 

with the fulfilling of seventy years at Babylon I shall turn my attention 

to YOU people, and I will establish toward YOU my good word in 

bringing YOU back to this place.” (NW) 

This utterance clearly presupposed that the seventy years were in 

progress at the time. If the period had not commenced, why did 

Jeremiah connect it with the exiles’ staying on at Babylon? If the 

seventy-year period was not already in progress, what relevance is 

there in Jeremiah’s reference to it? Jeremiah did not urge the exiles 

to wait until the seventy years would begin, but to wait until the 

period had been completed. As Jeremiah sent his message to the exiles 

some six or seven years before the destruction of Jerusalem, it is 

obvious that he reckoned the beginning of the seventy years from a 

point many years prior to that event.


The context of Jeremiah 29:10, therefore, further supports the 

earlier conclusion that the seventy years should be reckoned from a 

point several years before the destruction of Jerusalem. 

However, apart from the context, the text itself makes it clear 

that the seventy years can be applied neither to the period of the 

desolation of Jerusalem nor to the period of the Jewish exile. 

B-1: Seventy years—”at” Babylon or ‘for” Babylon? 

The New World Translation’s rendering of Jeremiah 29:10 seems to 

depict the seventy years as a period of captivity: “seventy years at 

Babylon.” Although it is true that the Hebrew preposition l e , here 

translated “at”, in certain expressions may have a local sense (”at, 

in”), its general meaning is “for, to, in regard to, with reference to,” 

and is so rendered at Jeremiah 29:10 by most modern 

translations. 26 

The following examples are taken from some of the better 

known translations in English: 

Revised Version (1885): “After seventy years be accomplished for 

Babylon.” 

26 The view that the basic meaning of l e (l) is local and directional is rejected by 

Professor Ernst Jenni, who is probably the leading authority on the Hebrew 

prepositions today.—Ernst Jenni, Die Hebräischen Präpositionen, Band 3: Die 

Präposition Lamed (Stuttgart, etc.: Verlag Kohlhammer, 2000), pp. 134, 135. This 

work devotes 350 pages to the examination of the preposition l e alone. 

(Interestingly, the Danish NWT of 1985 has “for Babylon”, and the new revised 

Swedish NWT of 2003, too, has now changed its earlier “in” to “for Babylon”!)


Rotherham’s The Emphasized Bible (3rd ed., 1897): “That as soon as 

there are fulfilled to Babylon seventy years.” 

American Standard Version (1901): “After seventy years are 

accomplished for Babylon.” 

New American Standard Version (1973): “When seventy years have 

been completed for Babylon.” 

New International Version (1978): “When seventy years are 

completed for Babylon.” 

The New Jerusalem Bible (1985): “When the seventy years granted to 

Babylon are over.” 

Other translations give expression to the same thought in other 

words: 

Smith-Goodspeed’s The Complete Bible (1931): “As soon as 

Babylon has finished seventy years.” 

Byington’s The Bible In Living English (1972): “As soon as Babylon 

has had a full seventy years.” 

The Anchor Bible (John Bright: Jeremiah, 2nd ed., 1986): “Only when 

Babylon’s seventy years have been completed.” 

Tanakh. The Holy Scriptures (The Jewish Publication Society, 1988): 

“When Babylon’s seventy years are over.” 

The Revised English Bible (1989): “When a full seventy years have 

passed over Babylon 

All these translations express the same thought, namely, that the 

seventy years refer to the Babylonian supremacy, not to the Jewish 

captivity nor to the desolation following the destruction of 

Jerusalem in 587 B.C.E. 

That this is what the Hebrew text meant to say is supported by 

the fact that it is in agreement with Jeremiah’s prophecy at 

Jeremiah 25:11 on the seventy years’ servitude. As long as the 

Babylonian king held supremacy, other nations had to serve him. 

The New World Translation, however, is not the only translation 

that renders the preposition l e by “at” in Jeremiah 29:10. Some 

other translations, too, use the preposition “at” in this text. The 

best known is the King James Version (KJV), originally published in 

1611, which for more than three centuries remained the Authorized 

Version (AV) for Anglican and many other Protestant churches. In 

the course of time this translation has acquired an authority and 

sanctity of its own. This is also reflected in modern revisions of


KJV. A recent example is the New King James Version (NKJV), 

published in 1982. Although the language has been modernized, 

the editors have endeavoured to retain the text of the old venerable 

KJV as far as possible. The progress made in the last two centuries, 

especially by the discoveries of numerous ancient manuscripts of 

the Bible, is at best reflected in the footnotes, not in the running 

text. That this very conservative version retains the preposition 

“at” in Jeremiah 29:10, therefore, is not to be wondered at. 

It is interesting to note, however, that other, less traditionbound 

revisions of KJV, such as RV, ASV, and RSV, have replaced 

“at” by “for” in Jeremiah 29:10, as shown by the quotations given 

above. And the latest revision of this kind, the New Revised Standard 

Version (1990), has replaced KJV’s “seventy years . . . at Babylon” 

by “Babylon’s seventy years”. 27 

Why do these and most other modern translations reject the 

rendering “at Babylon” in Jeremiah 29:10 in favour of “for 

Babylon” or some paraphrase conveying the same idea? 

B-2: What Hebrew scholars say 

Modern Hebrew scholars generally agree that the local or spatial 

sense of l e is highly improbable, if not impossible, at Jer. 29:10. Dr. 

Tor Magnus Amble at the University of Oslo, Norway, for 

example, says: 

”The preposition l e means ‘to’, ‘for’ (`direction towards’ or 

‘reference to’). Aside from in a few fixed expressions, it hardly has a 

locative sense, and in any case not here. Very often it introduces an 

indirect object (‘respecting to’, corresponding to a Greek dative). 

This is also how the translators of LXX have understood it, as you 

quite correctly point out. Thus the translation has to be: seventy 

years ‘for Babel’.” — Private letter dated November 23, 1990. 

(Emphasis added.) 

The Swedish Hebraist Dr. Seth Erlandsson is even more emphatic: 

”The spatial sense is impossible at Jer. 29:10. Nor has LXX ‘at 

Babylon’, but dative; consequently ‘for Babylon’ .” — Private letter 

dated December 23, 1990. (Emphasis added.) 

27 A few other modem translations that still have “at Babylon” in Jeremiah 29:10 may 

have been influenced, directly or indirectly, by KJV. One of my friends , a Danish 

1inguist, has also drawn my attention to the fact that the Latin Vulgate (4th 

century C.E.) has “in Babylon” in our text, which, like KJV’s “at Babylon”, is an 

interpretation rather than a translation. It is quite possible that this ancient and 

highly esteemed translation, too, may have influenced some modern translations.


It would be easy to add many other similar statements by Hebrew 

scholars, but it may suffice here to quote Professor Ernst Jenni at 

Basel, Switzerland. This leading authority on l e (footnote 26 above) 

says: 

The rendering in all modern commentaries and translations is 

“for Babel” (Babel as world power, not city or land); this is clear 

from the language as well as also from the context. By the “local 

meaning” a distinction is to be made between where? (in, at) and 

where to? (local directional “to, towards”). The basic meaning of l 

is with reference to, and with a following local specification it can 

be understood as local or local-directional only in certain adverbial 

expressions (e.g. Num. 11, 10 [Clines DCH IV, 481b] “at the 

entrance”, cf. Lamed pp. 256, 260, heading 8151). 

On the translations: LXX has with babylôni unambiguously a 

dative (”for Babylon”). Only Vulgata has, to be sure, in Babylone, 

“in Babylon”, thus King James Version “at Babylon”, and so 

probably also the New World Translation.—Letter Jenni-Jonsson, 

October 1, 2003. (Emphasis added.) 

Thus, as Jeremiah 29:10 literally speaks of seventy years “for 

Babylon,” it is clear that they cannot refer to the period of the 

desolation of Jerusalem and its temple, or even to the period of the 

Jewish exile at Babylon. Rather, like Jeremiah 25:10–12, what is in 

view is the period of Babylonian supremacy. This is also the conclusion 

arrived at by scholars who have carefully examined the text. Some 

typical comments are cited in the accompanying box. 

Jeremiah 25:10–12 and 29:10 contain the prophecy of the seventy 

years. The next two texts to be discussed, Daniel 9:2 and 2 

Chronicles 36:20–21, are just brief references to Jeremiah’s prophecy. 

Neither of them pretends to be a thorough discussion of the 

prophecy nor gives a detailed application of the period. Every 

attempt to find an application of the seventy-year period, therefore, 

must proceed from the prophecy, not from the references to it. It is only 

the prophecy that gives specific details on the seventy years, as 

follows, (1) that they refer to “these nations,” (2) that they were to 

be a period of servitude for these nations, (3) that they refer to the 

period of Babylonian supremacy, and (4) that this period would be 

fulfilled when the king of Babylon was punished. Such detailed 

information is missing in the latter references to the prophecy by 

Daniel and Ezra. The discussion of these references, then, should 

always be done in the light of what the prophecy actually is about.


The seventy years "for Babylon" 

"The sense of the Hebrew original might even be rendered 

thus: ‘After seventy years of (the rule of) Babylon are 

accomplished etc.’ The seventy years counted here evidently 

refer to Babylon and not to the Judeans or to their captivity. 

They mean seventy years of Babylonian rule, the end of which 

will see the redemption of the exiles"—Dr. Avigdor On, "The 

seventy years of Babylon," Vetus Testamentum, Vol. VI (1956), p. 

305. 

"It is appropriate to begin with the passages of Jeremiah and to 

observe, with On, that the references in Jer. 25:11-12 and 

29:10—whether original to the passages or not—are to a period 

of seventy years of Babylonian rule, and not to a period of 

seventy years of actual captivity"—Dr. Peter R. Ackroyd, "Two 

Old Testament historical problems of the early Persian period," 

Journal of Near Eastern Studies, Vol. XVII (1958), p. 23. 

"Certainly it must be stressed that the seventy years refer 

primarily to the time of Babylonian world dominion and not to 

the time of the exile, as is often carelessly supposed. As an 

estimate of Babylon’s domination of the ancient Near East it 

was a remarkably accurate figure, for from the Battle of 

Carchemish (605) to the fall of Babylon to Cyrus (539) was 

sixty-six years"—Professor Norman K. Gottwald, All the 

Kingdoms of the Earth (New York, Evanston, London: Harper & 

Row, Publishers, 1964), pp. 265, 266. 

"It has often been pointed out that the textually 

unobjectionable verse with its seventy years does not have in 

view the length of the exile , but rather the duration of the 

Babylonian dominion, which from its beginning until the 

Persian conquest of Babylon may be calculated to about seven 

decades. "—Dr. Otto Plöger, Aus der Spätzeit des Alten Testaments 

(Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1971), p. 68. (Translated 

from the German.) 

C: DANIEL 9:1–2 

The Babylonian dominion was definitely broken when the armies 

of Cyrus the Persian captured Babylon in the night between the 

12 th and 13 th October, 539 B.C.E. (Julian calendar). Previously in 

the same night Belshazzar, the son of king Nabonidus and his 

deputy on the throne, got to know that the days of Babylon were 

numbered. Daniel the prophet, in his interpretation of the 

miraculous writing on the wall, told him that “God has numbered


[the days or years of] your kingdom and has finished it.” In that 

very night Belshazzar was killed, and the kingdom was given to 

“Darius the Mede.” (Daniel 5:26–31, NW) Obviously, the seventy 

years allotted to Babylon ended that night. This sudden collapse of 

the Babylonian empire incited Daniel to turn his attention to 

Jeremiah’s prophecy of the seventy years. He tells us: 

Daniel 9:1–2: 

In the first year of Darius the son of Ahasuerus of the seed of 

the Medes, who had been made king over the kingdom of the 

Chaldeans; in the first year of his reigning I myself, Daniel, 

discerned by the books the number of the years concerning which 

the word of Jehovah had occurred to Jeremiah the prophet, for 

fulfilling the devastations of Jerusalem, [namely,] seventy years. ― 

Daniel 9:1–2, NW. 

It is not unreasonable to think that the “books” consulted by 

Daniel may have been a collection of scrolls containing the 

prophecies of Jeremiah. But the sources for his inquiry may as well 

have been limited to the letters that Jeremiah had sent to the exiles 

in Babylon fifty-six years earlier (Jeremiah 29:1–32), the first of 

which dealt with the seventy years “for Babylon.” 28 No doubt, 

these letters, at 1east, were available to him. The content of Daniel 

9, in fact, and especially the prayer of Daniel recorded in verses 4– 

19, is closely related to the content of Jeremiah’s 1etters, as has 

been demonstrated in detail by Dr. Gerald H. Wilson. 29 

C-1: Did Daniel understand the seventy-year prophecy? 

When Daniel states that he “discerned” (NW) in the writings of 

Jeremiah the prophecy of the seventy years, does this mean that he 

“understood” (KJV, RV, ASV) the sense of this prophecy and 

realized that the period had now ended? Or is he merely saying that 

he “noticed” (Moffatt) or “observed” (NASB) the seventy years 

mentioned by Jeremiah and “tried to understand” (NAB) them? 

The Hebrew verb used here, bîn, may contain all these various 

shades of meaning. However, if Daniel had any difficulties in 

28 The Hebrew word translated “books” at Dan. 9:2, s e parîm, the plural form of seper, 

was used of writings of various kinds, including legal documents and letters. Thus 

the word seper is also used of Jeremiah’s first “letter” to the exiles at Babylon 

recorded in Jeremiah 29:1–23. Verses 24–32 of the same chapter quotes from a 

second letter sent by Jeremiah to the Jewish exiles, probably later in the same 

year or early next year. 

29 Gerald H. Wilson, “The Prayer of Daniel 9: Reflection on Jeremiah 29,” Journal for 

the Study of the Old Testament, Issue 48, October 1990, pp. 91–99.


understanding the meaning of this seventy-year period, one would 

expect that the prayer he offered as a result of his reading would 

contain a plea for understanding the prediction. But not once in his 

lengthy prayer does Daniel mention the seventy years. Instead, the 

whole emphasis of his prayer is on the Jewish exiles and the 

conditions set forth in Jeremiah’s letter for their return to 

Jerusalem. 30 

It seems logical to conclude, therefore, that Daniel had no 

problems in understanding the seventy-year prophecy. As a 

Hebrew-speaking Jew, he would have no difficulties in 

understanding that the Hebrew text of Jeremiah 29:10 speaks of 

seventy years “for Babylon,” and that this was a reference to the 

period of Babylonian supremacy. From the fact that this supremacy 

had just ended, Daniel could draw only one conclusion: The 

seventy years had ended! 

Of greater importance for Daniel, however, was what the end of 

the seventy years could mean for his own people, the Jewish exiles 

at Babylon, and for the devastated city of Jerusalem and its ruined 

temple. And this was the subject that Daniel brought up in his 

prayer. 

C-2: The purpose of Daniel’s prayer 

According to Jeremiah’s letter, Jehovah had promised that, “When 

seventy years have been completed for Babylon, I will visit you and 

fulfill my good word to you, to bring you back to this place.” —Jeremiah 

29:10, NASB. 

As the seventy years “for Babylon” were now completed and 

“the first year” of “Darius the Mede” was well in progress, why had 

Jehovah still not fulfilled his promise to bring the exiles in Babylon 

back to Jerusalem (the “place” from which they had once been 

deported, Jeremiah 29:1, 20), thus ending the desolate state of their 

city? Would not the end of the seventy years “for Babylon” be 

followed by the end of the exile and the desolation of Jerusalem? Why the delay? 

Judging from Daniel’s prayer this matter appears to have been his 

prime concern and the actual cause for his prayer. 

In his letter to the exiles Jeremiah also had explained that 

Jehovah’s fulfilling of his promise to restore them to Jerusalem 

after the end of the seventy years rested on certain conditions: 

If you invoke me and pray to me, I will listen to you: when you 

seek me, you shall find me; if you search with all your heart, I will 

let you find me, says the LORD. I will restore your fortunes and 

30 Compare the discussion of Gerald H. Wilson, op. cit., pp. 94, 95.


gather you again from all the places to which I have banished you, 

says the LORD, and bring you back to the place from which I 

have carried you into exile.―Jeremiah 29:12–14a, NEB. 

The conditions to be fulfilled before the exiles could be returned 

to Jerusalem, then, were that they had to return to Jehovah, by 

seeking him with prayer, confessing their sins, and starting to listen 

to his voice. And this was precisely what Daniel did: 

”And I proceeded to set my face to Jehovah the [true] God, in 

order to seek [him] with prayer and entreaties, with fasting and 

sackcloth and ashes.”―Daniel 9:3, NW. 

From Daniel’s prayer, recorded in the subsequent verses (4–19), 

it is clear that his main interest was in seeking forgiveness for his 

people in order that they might be returned to their homeland. He 

knew that the “devastations of Jerusalem” and the desolation of 

the land were the curse predicted “in the law of Moses” (Daniel 

9:13; compare Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28), because of their 

violating Jehovah’s law. (Daniel 9:11) He knew that Jehovah would 

bring them back to their land only when they returned to him and 

began to listen to his voice. Awareness of this condition, laid down 

in the law (Deuteronomy 30:1–6) and repeated and emphasized in 

the letter of Jeremiah, is reflected in Daniel’s prayer. Obviously, his 

interest in Jeremiah’s prophecy of the seventy years was motivated 

by the exciting discovery that the end of the desolation of 

Jerusalem was close at hand, as the seventy years “for Babylon” 

now had been completed. 

C-3: The relation of the seventy years to “the devastations 

of Jerusalem” 

Daniel, then, in his examination of Jeremiah’s letter, evidently took 

a great interest in the fact that the end of the seventy years “for 

Babylon” was directly linked to the end of the desolation of 

Jerusalem. The end of the latter period presupposed and was 

dependent on the end of the former: 

Only when Babylon’s seventy years are completed will I visit 

you, and I will fulfill to you my promise and bring you back to this 

place [Jerusalem] . — Jeremiah 29:10, NRSV. 

This was evidently the reason why Daniel, in his reference to 

Jeremiah’s prophecy, connected the seventy years “for Babylon”


with Jerusalem, speaking of them as “the number of years . . . for 

fulfilling the devastations of Jerusalem.” (Daniel 9:2, NW) It was clear 

from Jeremiah’s letter that the completion of Babylon’s seventy 

years would entail the “fulfilling of the desolations of Jerusalem” 

(by the return of the exiles), and it is this consequence that Daniel lays 

the stress on in his statement. 31 

Read in isolation from the wider context, however, these words 

could easily be misinterpreted to mean that Daniel equated the 

seventy-year period with the period of Jerusalem’s desolation. 

Some Bible translators have understood the text that way. Thus 

Tanakh, a translation published by the Jewish Publication Society in 

1985, speaks of “the number of years that . . . were to be the term of 

Jerusalem’s desolation—seventy years .” Similarly, The New International 

Version (NIV) presents Daniel as saying that, “I understood from 

the Scriptures . . . that the desolation of Jerusalem would last seventy years.” 

Both of these translations, however, are freely paraphrasing the 

passage, which neither speaks of the “term” of Jerusalem’s 

desolation, nor that it would “last” seventy years. None of these 

words are found in the original text. They have been added in an 

attempt to interpret the text. There is no compelling reason to accept 

this interpretation, not only because it is arrived at by a 

paraphrasing of the text, but also because it is in direct conflict 

with Jeremiah’s own prophecy. 32 

It should be noted that Daniel himself does not equate the 

seventy years with the period of Jerusalem’s desolation. It is only 

the expiration of the seventy-year period―not the period as a whole 

— that he relates to the “fulfilling of the desolations of Jerusalem.” 

This focusing on the end of the period is totally absent in the two 

translations quoted above (Tanakh and NIV), as they both fail to 

31 Dr. C. F. Keil, one of the greatest Hebrew scholars of the 19th century, noticed in 

his grammatical analysis how Daniel connected and yet distinguished the two 

periods, concluding: “Consequently, in the first year of the reign of Darius the 

Mede over the kingdom of the Chaldeans the seventy years prophesied of by 

Jeremiah were now full, the period of the desolation of Jerusalem determined by 

God was almost expired?’ —C. F. Keil, Biblical Commentary on the Book of Daniel 

(Edinburgh: Clark, 1872), pp. 321, 322. 

32 A number of critical scholars, who regard the book of Daniel as a late composition 

from the end of the reign of Antiochus IV Epiphanes (175–164 B.C.E.), have argued 

that Jeremiah’s original prophecy of the seventy years was repeatedly reinterpreted 

and reapplied by the later Bible writers Ezra, Zechariah, and Daniel. There is no 

reason to discuss these theories here, especially as there is wide disagreement on 

them among these scholars.


translate the Hebrew word l e mal’ot, “fulfilling, to fulfill”. Most 

translations (including The New World Translation) are more in 

conformity with the original text in this respect. 33 

What Daniel discovered by reading Jeremiah’s letter, then, was 

not that Jerusalem’s desolation would last for seventy years (for this 

is nowhere stated in Jeremiah), but that the desolations of 

Jerusalem would not cease until the seventy years “for Babylon” 

had ceased. The focus of the “seventy years” was on Babylon, and 

her period of dominance, rather than on Jerusalem. 

The end of Babylon’s dominance would, of course, as a natural 

consequence or byproduct, open up the prospect for a Jewish return to 

Jerusalem. This is the simplest meaning of Daniel’s words in the 

light of what was actually written in Jeremiah’s letter. As the 

Babylonian supremacy suddenly had been replaced by the Medo- 

Persian rule and the seventy years “for Babylon” and her 

international domination had thus been completed, Daniel 

understood—by the aid of Jeremiah’s letter—that the completion 

of the devastations of Jerusalem was now due. This was the reason 

for Daniel’s excitement and strong feelings, as expressed in his 

prayer. 

D: 2 CHRONICLES 36:20–23 

The two books of Chronicles record the history of Israel up to the 

end of the Jewish exile in Babylon. These books, therefore, must 

have been finished some time after that event. The last verses of 2 

Chronicles connect the fulfillment of Jeremiah’s prophecy of the 

seventy years with the Persian conquest of Babylon and the end of 

the Jewish captivity, as follows: 

2 Chronicles 36:20–23: 

20 Furthermore, he [Nebuchadnezzar] carried off those 

remaining from the sword captive to Babylon, and they came to be 

servants to him and his sons until the royalty of Persia began to 

reign; 21 to fulfill Jehovah’s word by the mouth of Jeremiah, until 

the land had paid off its Sabbaths. All the days of lying 

desolated it kept sabbath, to fulfill seventy years. 

33 A detailed grammatical analysis of the Hebrew text of Dan. 9:2 has been received 

from the linguist mentioned in note 27 above, which step by step clarifies the exact 

meaning of the verse. In conclusion, the following translation was offered, in close 

accord with the original text: “In his [Darius’] first regnal year I, Daniel, 

ascertained, in the writings, that the number of years, which according to the word 

of JHWH to Jeremiah the prophet would be completely fulfilled, with respect to the 

desolate state of Jerusalem, were seventy years.”


22 And in the first year of Cyrus the king of Persia, that Jehovah’s 

word by the mouth of Jeremiah might be accomplished, Jehovah 

roused the spirit of Cyrus the king of Persia, so that he caused a 

cry to pass through all his kingdom, and also in writing, saying: 23 

“This is what Cyrus the king of Persia has said, ‘All the kingdoms 

of the earth Jehovah the God of the heavens has given me, and he 

himself has commissioned me to build him a house in Jerusalem, 

which is in Judah. Whoever there is among YOU of all his people, 

Jehovah his God be with him. So 1et him go up.’ “(NW) 

It may be observed that the Chronicler repeatedly emphasizes 

the agreement between the prophecies of Jeremiah and its fulfillment 

in the events he records. Thus the statement in verse 20 is an 

application of Jeremiah 27:7: “And all the nations shall serve him, and 

his son, and his grandson, until the time of his own land comes”. This time 

of Babylon came, the Chronicler explains, when “the royalty of 

Persia began to reign [i.e., in 539 B.C.E.], to fulfill Jehovah’s word 

by the mouth of Jeremiah, . .. to fulfill seventy years.” This, then, 

would also fulfill the prediction at Jeremiah 25:12, that the time of 

Babylon would come “when seventy years have been fulfilled.” 

Thus the Chronicler seems clearly to be saying that the seventy 

years were fulfilled at the Persian conquest of Babylon. 

What complicates the matter in our text is the statement 

(italicized in the quotation above) about the “sabbath rest” of the 

land, which is inserted in the middle of the reference to Jeremiah’s 

prophecy. This has caused a number of scholars to conclude that 

the Chronicler reinterpreted the prophecy of Jeremiah by applying the 

seventy years to the period of the desolation of Judah. 34 

Such an understanding, however, would not only conflict with 

Jeremiah’s prophecy; it would also contradict the Chronicler’s own 

emphasis on the agreement between the original prophecy and its 

fulfillment. So what did the Chronicler mean by his insertion of the 

statement about the sabbath rest of the land? 

D-1: The sabbath rest of the land 

A cursory reading of verse 21 could give the impression that the 

Chronicler states that the land had enjoyed a sabbath rest of 

seventy years, and that this had been predicted by Jeremiah. But 

34 See, for example, Avigdor Orr in Vetus Testamentum, Vol. VI (1956), p. 306, and 

Michael Fishbane in Biblical Interpretation in Ancient Israel (Oxford: Clarendon 

Press, 1985) pp. 480–81.


Jeremiah does not speak of the seventy years in terms of allowing 

the land to pay off its sabbath years. In fact, there is no reference at 

all to a sabbath rest for the land in his book. 

Therefore Ezra’s words, “until the land had paid off its 

sabbaths; all the days of lying desolated it kept sabbath,” could not 

be a fulfillment of “Jehovah’s word by the mouth of Jeremiah.” The 

two clauses about the sabbath rest are, as has been observed by 

Bible commentators, a reference to another prediction, found at 

Leviticus, chapter 26. 

Among other things, this chapter forewarns that, if the people 

did not obey the law of the sabbatical years (discussed in the preceding 

chapter, Leviticus 25), they would be scattered among the nations 

and their land would be desolated. 35 In this way the land would be 

allowed to “pay off its sabbaths”: 

At that time the land will pay off its sabbaths all the days of its lying 

desolated, while YOU are in the land of YOUR enemies. At that 

time the land will keep sabbath, as it must repay its sabbaths. All 

the days of its lying desolated it will keep sabbath, for the reason that it 

did not keep sabbath during YOUR sabbaths when YOU were 

dwelling upon it.—Leviticus 26:34–35, NW. 

Like Daniel earlier, the writer of the Chronicles understood the 

desolation of Judah to be a fulfillment of this curse predicted in the 

law of Moses. He therefore inserted this prediction from Leviticus 

26 to show that it was fulfilled after the final deportation to 

Babylon, exactly as was predicted through Moses, “while you are in 

the land of your enemies.” 36 By inserting the two clauses from 

Leviticus 26, the Chronicler did not mean to say that the land 

enjoyed a sabbath rest of seventy years, as this was not predicted, 

either by Moses or by Jeremiah. He does not tell explicitly how long it 

rested, only that “all the days of lying desolated it kept sabbath.”―2 

Chronicles 36:20. 37 

As with Daniel, the main interest of the Chronicler was the 

return of the exiles, and therefore he points out that they had to 

remain in Babylonia until two prophecies had been fulfilled: (1) 

35 According to the law of the sabbatical years the land would enjoy a sabbath rest 

every seventh year, i.e., the land should lie fallow and not be cultivated. (Leviticus 

25:1–7) This “served to reduce the quantity of alkalines, sodium and calcium, 

deposited in the soil by irrigation waters.”—Baruch A. Levine, The JPS 

Commentary: Leviticus (Philadelphia, New York, Jerusalem: The Jewish Publication 

Society, 1989), p. 272. Violation of this ordinance would gradually destroy the soil 

and drastically reduce the crop yields. 

36 Some translators have put the Chronicler’s quotation from Leviticus 26 within 

dashes or in parentheses (as does the Swedish translation of 1917), in order to 

emphasize that they do not refer to Jeremiah. 

37 The actual 1ength of the 1and’s sabbath rest was 49 years, from the final 

desolation and depopulation in 587 B.C.E. until the return of the exiles in 538.


that of Jeremiah on the seventy years of supremacy “for Babylon,” 

and (2) that in Leviticus on the desolation and sabbath rest for the 

land of Judah. These prophecies should not be mixed up or 

confused, as is often done. Not only do they refer to periods of 

different character and different 1engths; they also refer to 

different nations. But as the two periods were closely connected in 

that the end of one period was contingent on the end of the other, 

the Chronicler, like Daniel, brought them together. 

D-2: Jeremiah’s prophecy on the return of the exiles 

Many commentators hold that the Chronicler ended the seventy 

years in the first year of Cyrus (538/37 B.C.E.), because of what he 

says in the last two verses: 

And in the first year of Cyrus the king of Persia, that Jehovah’s 

word by the mouth of Jeremiah might be accomplished, Jehovah 

roused the spirit of Cyrus the king of Persia, so that he caused a 

cry to pass through all his kingdom, and also in writing, saying: 

”This is what Cyrus the king of Persia has said, ‘All the 

kingdoms of the earth Jehovah the God of the heavens has given 

me, and he himself has commissioned me to build him a house in 

Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever there is among YOU of all 

his people, Jehovah his God be with him. So let him go up.’ “―2 

Chronicles 36:22–23, NW. 

If Jehovah’s word “by the mouth of Jeremiah” is here taken to 

be another reference to the seventy years, it might prove that Ezra 

ended that period in 538/37 B.C.E. But in view of the fact that 

these verses actually deal with Cyrus’ decree allowing the Jews 

Perhaps it is just a coincidence, but this was also the maximal period during 

which a Hebrew could be deprived of the proprietorship of his ancestral 

inheritance, according to the law of land tenure. If he became so poor that he had 

to sell his land, it could not be sold beyond reclaim. If it could not be bought back, 

the purchaser had to return it to him at the next jubilee.—Leviticus 25:8–28. 

If the 49 years of sabbath rest corresponded to the exact number of sabbatical 

years that had been neglected by the Israelites, the whole period of violation of the 

law would be 49 x 7 = 343 years. If this period extended to 587 B.C.E., its 

beginning would date from about 930 B.C.E. Interestingly, modern chronologers 

who have carefully examined both the Biblical and extra-Biblical evidence, usually 

date the division of the kingdom to 930 B.C.E. or thereabouts. (F. X. Kugler, for 

example, has 930, E. R. Thiele and K. A. Kitchen 931/30, and W. H. Barnes 932 

B.C.E.) As this national disaster resulted in a massive break away from the temple 

cult in Jerusalem by a majority of the people, it is not unreasonable to think that 

an extensive neglect of the sabbatical years also dates from this time.


to return to their homeland, it is more natural to understand his 

reference to Jeremiah’s prophecy as a reference to what the 

prophet said immediately after his prediction of the seventy years 

“for Babylon” at Jeremiah 29:10: 

For thus says the LORD, ‘When seventy years have been 

completed for Babylon, I will visit you and fulfill my good word to you, to 

bring you back to this place.’ — Jeremiah 29:10, NASB. 

Note that the prophet did not say that Jehovah first would visit 

the exiles, causing them to return to Jerusalem, and that as a result of 

that the seventy years would be accomplished. This is how the 

Watch Tower Society applies this prophecy. To the contrary, the 

prophet clearly states that the seventy years would be accomplished 

first, and after their fulfillment Jehovah would visit the exiles and 

cause them to return to Jerusalem. The seventy years, then, would be 

fulfilled while the Jewish exiles were still in Babylon! 

And so it happened: Babylon fell to Cyrus, the king of Persia, in 

October, 539 B.C.E., thus fulfilling the prophecy of the seventy 

years “for Babylon.” The next year Cyrus issued his decree, 

allowing the Jewish exiles to return to Jerusalem. 38 The end of the 

seventy years at the fall of Babylon, and the return of the Jews one 

year later are two separate events, and it is the last of these that 

Ezra is speaking of at 2 Chronicles 36:22–23. His reference to the 

word “by the mouth of Jeremiah” in these verses, then, must be a 

reference to the second half of verse 10 in chapter 29 of the book 

of Jeremiah. 

Thus we find that 2 Chronicles 36:20–23, like Daniel 9:2, may be 

brought into harmony with the prophecy of Jeremiah on the 

seventy years. The Chronicler ends the period while the Jewish 

exiles were stil1 living in Babylonia, when “the royalty of Persia 

began to reign” in 539 B.C.E. He lays stress upon the fact that the 

Jewish exiles could not return to Jerusalem until Babylon’s seventy 

years had been fulfilled, and the land had paid off its sabbaths. 

After that Jehovah caused them to return to their homeland, in 

fulfillment of Jeremiah 29:10b, in the first year of Cyrus. The words 

of the Chronicler, correctly understood, cannot be taken to mean 

that the desolation of Judah after the destruction of Jerusalem and 

its temple lasted for seventy years. 

38 As argued earlier (chapter 3 above, note 2), the Jewish remnant most probably 

returned from the exile in 538 B.C.E., not in 537 as the Watch Tower Society 

insists.


The last two texts to be discussed, Zechariah 1:7–12 and 7:1–5, 

are sometimes thought to be two additional references to 

Jeremiah’s prophecy about the seventy years, and the Watch Tower 

Society holds them to be so. But the evidence for this conclusion is 

totally lacking. 

None of the texts contains any reference to Jeremiah (as do 

Daniel 9:1–2 and 2 Chronicles 36:20–23), and the context of these 

texts strongly indicates that the seventy years mentioned there must 

be given a different application. This is also the conclusion of many 

commentators. 39 This will also become apparent in the following 

discussion. 

E: ZECHARIAH 1:7–12 

The first statement about a period of seventy years in the book of 

Zechariah appears in a vision given to Zechariah on “the twentyfourth 

[day] of the eleventh month, that is, the month Shebat, in 

the second year of Darius.”—Zechariah 1:7. 

Darius’ second regnal year corresponded to 520/19 B.C.E., and 

the twenty-fourth day of the eleventh month may be translated to 

15 February 519 B.C.E. in the Julian calendar. 40 Although the Jews 

had resumed the work on the temple in Jerusalem five months 

earlier (Haggai 1:1, 14–15), Jerusalem and the cities of Judah were 

still in a sorry condition. That is why the angel in Zechariah’s vision 

brings up a question that undoubtedly troubled many of the 

repatriated Jews: 

Zechariah 1:12: 

So the angel of Jehovah answered and said: “O Jehovah of 

armies, how long will you yourself not show mercy to Jerusalem 

and to the cities of Judah, whom you have denounced these 

seventy years?” (NW) 

39 Dr. Otto Plöger, for example, notes that “the two texts in the book of Jeremiah are 

not referred to here”—O. Plöger, Aus der Spätzeit des Alten Testaments (Göttingen: 

Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1971), p.69. 

40 R. A. Parker & W. H. Dubberstein, Babylonian Chronology 626 B.C.—A.D. 75 

(Providence, Rhode Island: Brown University Press, 1956), p. 30. This presupposes 

that the date is given according to the Persian accession year system. If Zechariah 

applies the Jewish nonaccession year system, the date would have fallen about 

one year earlier, in February, 520 B.C.E. (See E. J. Bickerman’s discussion of this 

problem in Revue Biblique, Vol. 88, 1981, pp. 19–28). The Watch Tower Society 

accepts the secular dating of Darius’ reign, as may be seen, for example, on page 

124 of the book Paradise Restored to Mankind—By Theocracy! (Brooklyn, N.Y.: 

Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 1972).


E-1: Denunciation for seventy years or ninety? 

According to the angel, Jehovah had denounced Jerusalem and the 

cities of Judah for seventy years. The Watch Tower Society applies 

these seventy years of denouncement (”indignation,” KJV, ASV; 

“wrath,” NEB) to the period 607–537 B.C.E., thus equating them 

with the seventy years of Jeremiah 25:10–12 and 29:10. 41 It seems 

evident, though, that the reason why the angel put this question 

about the denouncement was that Jehovah still, in Darius’ second 

year (519 B.C.E.), had not shown mercy to the cities of Judah. Or 

did the angel mean to say that Jehovah had denounced Jerusalem 

and the cities of Judah for seventy years up to 537 B.C.E., and then 

continued to be hostile against them for about eighteen more years 

up to 519? This would make the period of hostility nearly ninety 

years, not seventy. 42 

But the “indignation” or “wrath” clearly refers to the devastated 

state of the cities of Judah, including Jerusalem and its temple, 

which began after the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 B.C.E. This 

condition was still prevailing, as may be seen from Jehovah’s 

answer to the angel’s question: 

Therefore this is what Jehovah has said, “I shall certainly return 

to Jerusalem with mercies. My own house will be built in her,” is 

the utterance of Jehovah of armies, “and a measuring line itself will 

be stretched out over Jerusalem.” 

Call out further, saying, “This is what Jehovah of armies has 

said: ‘My cities will yet overflow with goodness; and Jehovah will 

yet certainly feel regrets over Zion and yet actually choose 

Jerusalem.’ “ —Zechariah 1:16–17, NW. 

41 Paradise Restored to Mankind—by Theocracy!, pp. 131–134. 

42 The Watch Tower Society attempts to explain this contradiction by arguing that 

Jehovah had denounced the cities of Judah for 70 years up to 537 B.C.E., but 

allowed the Gentile nations to carry on the denunciation up to the time of 

Zechariah, making it seem as if he was still denouncing the cities of Judah! —Ibid., 

pp. 131–34. 

Also from a grammatical point of view it is difficult to uphold the idea that the 

seventy years here refer to a period that had ended many years in the past. The 

demonstrative pronoun “these” (Hebr. zeh) denotes something near in time or 

space. Commenting on the expression “these seventy years” at Zech. 1:12, the 

Swedish Hebraist Dr. Seth Erlandsson explains: “Literally it says ‘these 70 years,’ 

also at 7:5, which is tantamount to ‘now for 70 years.’ “ (Letter Erlandsson- 

Jonsson, dated Dec. 23, 1990.) This is evidently the reason why Professor Hinckley 

G. Mitchell renders the phrase as “now seventy years” in both texts.—H. G. 

Mitchell in S. R. Driver, A. Plummer, & C. A. Briggs (eds.), The International Critical 

Commentary. A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi 

and Jonah (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1912), pp. 123–24, 199–200.


Counted from 587 B.C.E. the indignation had now, in 519, 

lasted for nearly seventy years, or sixty-eight years to be exact. And 

if counted from the beginning of the siege on January 27, 589 B.C.E. 

(2 Kings 25:1; Ezekiel 24:1–2; Jeremiah 52:4), the indignation had 

lasted for almost exactly seventy years on February 15, 519. But 

just two months earlier the work on the foundation of the temple 

had been finished. (Haggai 2:18) From that time onward Jehovah 

began to remove his indignation: “From this day I shall bestow 

blessing.” ― Haggai 2:19, NW. 

It seems clear, therefore, that the seventy years mentioned in 

this text do not refer to the prophecy of Jeremiah, but simply to 

the time that had elapsed by 519 B.C.E. since the siege and 

destruction of Jerusalem and its temple in 589–587 B.C.E. 43 

That seventy years elapsed from the destruction of the temple in 

587 B.C.E. to its rebuilding in the years 520–515 is also confirmed 

by the next text in the book of Zechariah to be considered. 

F: ZECHARIAH 7:1–5 

Again, the event recorded in this passage is exactly dated, to “the 

fourth year of Darius . . . on the fourth [day] of the ninth month.” 

(Zech. 7: 1) This date corresponds to December 7, 518 B.C.E. 

(Julian calendar). 44 

Zechariah 7:1–5: 

Furthermore, it came about that in the fourth year of Darius the 

king the word of Jehovah occurred to Zechariah, on the fourth 

[day] of the ninth month, [that is,] in Chislev. And Bethel 

proceeded to send Sharezer and Regem-melech and his men to 

43 This is also the conclusion of many modern commentators. J.A. Thompson, for 

example, says: “In Zech. 1:12 it seems to denote the interval between the 

destruction of the temple in 587 B .C. and its rebuilding in 520–515 B.C.” (The 

Book of Jeremiah. Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1980, p. 514.) 

Dr. Carroll Stuhlmueller observes that, “if we tabulate from the beginning of 

Babylon’s plans for the first siege of Jerusalem (590/589; 2 Kgs. 24:10) to the time 

of this vision (520), the seventy years show up in a remarkably accurate way!” — 

Stuhlmueller, Rebuilding with Hope. A Commentary an the Books of Haggai and 

Zechariah (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publ. Co., 1988), p. 64. 

44 Parker & Dubberstein, ap. cit. (note 40 above), p. 30.


soften the face of Jehovah, saying to the priests who belonged to 

the house of Jehovah of armies, and to the prophets, even saying: 

“Shall I weep in the fifth month, practicing an abstinence, the way 

I have done these O how many years?” And the word of Jehovah 

of armies continued to occur to me, saying: “Say to all the people 

of the 1and and to the priests, ‘When YOU fasted and there was a 

wailing in the fifth [month] and in the seventh [month] , and this for 

seventy years [literally ‘these seventy years,’ as in 1:12], did you really 

fast to me, even me?’ “ (NW) 

F-1: Fasting and wailing—for seventy years or ninety? 

Why did “all the people of the land” fast and wail in the fifth 

month and in the seventh month? Speaking of the fast in the fifth 

month the Watch Tower Society admits: 

It was observed evidently on the tenth day of that month (Ab), 

in order to commemorate how on that day Nebuzaradan, the chief 

of Nebuchadnezzar’s bodyguard, after two days of inspection, 

burned down the city of Jerusalem and its temple. (Jer. 52:12, 13; 2 

Kings 25:8, 9) 45 

Further, the fast in the seventh month was “to commemorate 

the assassination of Governor Gedaliah, who was of the royal 

house of King David and whom Nebuchadnezzar made governor 

of the land for the poor Jews who were allowed to remain after the 

destruction of Jerusalem. (2 Kings 25:22–25; Jer. 40:13 to 41:l0)” 46 

For how long had the Jews been fasting in these months in 

memory of the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple and the 

assassination of Gedaliah? For “seventy years,” according to 

Zecharaiah 7:5. The year 518/17 was the seventieth year since 587 

B.C.E.! 47 

That the Jews still, in 518 B.C.E., held these fasts in the fifth and 

seventh months is clear from the fact that the men from Bethel 

had come to ask if they, “now that the faithful remnant of Jews 

were rebuilding the temple of Jehovah at Jerusalem and were 

45 Paradise Restored to Mankind—by Theocracy!, p. 235. 

46 Ibid.—Zechariah 8:19 shows that days of fasting and mourning in memory of 

various fateful events during the siege and destruction of Jerusalem were held in 

four different months: (1) in the tenth month (because of the beginning of the siege 

of Jerusalem in January, 589 B.C.E., 2 Kings 25:1–2); (2) in the fourth month 

(because of the capture of Jerusalem in July, 587 B.C.E., 2 Kings 25:2–4; Jer. 

52:67); (3) in the fifth month (because of the burning of the temple in August, 587 

B.C.E., 2 Kings 25:8–9); and (4) in the seventh month (because of the assassination 

of Gedaliah in October, 587 B.C.E., 2 Kings 25:22–25). 

47 From the end of August 587 B.C.E., when the temple was burned down, to 

December 518 it was sixty-nine years and about four months. From October 587, 

when the remaining Jews fled to Egypt and left Judah desolated, to December 518 

was sixty-nine years and about two months.


about half through, should . . . continue to hold such a fast.” 48 

If now the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple is dated in 

607 B.C.E. instead of 587, once again this would make the time 

these fasts had been observed ninety years rather than seventy. This 

is actually conceded by the Watch Tower Society in the book 

quoted above, but no satisfying explanation is given for this 

discrepancy. 49 

Thus Zechariah 1:7–12 and 7:1–5 both give very strong support 

for the year 587 B.C.E. as the correct date for the destruction of 

Jerusalem. As in the case of Jeremiah 25:10–12; 29:10; Daniel 1:12 

and 2:1, the easiest and the most direct reading of Zechariah 1:7–12 

and 7:1–7, too, is seen to be in open conflict with the interpretation 

the Watch Tower Society gives to the seventy years. 

G: THE APPLICATION OF THE SEVENTY YEARS OF 

SERVITUDE 

From a close examination of the texts dealing with the seventy 

years, certain facts have been established that cannot be ignored in 

any attempt to find an application of the seventy-year period that is 

in harmony with both the Bible and historical facts: 

(1) The seventy years refer to many nations, not Judah only: 

Jeremiah 25:11. 

(2) The seventy years refer to a period of servitude for these 

nations, that is, vassalage to Babylon: Jeremiah 25:11. 

(3) The seventy years refer to the period of Babylonian supremacy, 

“seventy years for Babylon”: Jeremiah 29:10. 

(4) The seventy years were accomplished when the Babylonian 

king and his nation were punished, that is, in 539 B.C.E.: Jeremiah 

25:12. 

48 Paradise Restored to Mankind—by Theocracy!, p. 235. 

49 “When the exiled Jews fasted during the seventy years of desolation of the land of 

Judah and also during all these years since the remnant of them returned to their 

homeland, were they really fasting to Jehovah?”—Paradise Restored to Mankind— 

by Theocracy!, p. 237. (Emphasis added.)


(5) The seventy years of servitude began many years before the 

destruction of Jerusalem: Jeremiah chapters 27, 28, and 35; Daniel 

1:1–4; 2:1; 2 Kings 24:1–7; the Babylonian chronicles, and 

Berossus. 

(6) Zechariah 1:7–12 and 7:1–5 are not references to Jeremiah’s prophecy, 

but refer to the period from the siege and destruction of 

Jerusalem in the years 589–587 to the rebuilding of the temple in 

the years 520–515 B.C.E. 

The application given by the Watch Tower Society to the 

seventy-year prophecy, that it refers to Judah only, and to the 

period of complete desolation of the land, “without an inhabitant,” 

following the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple, is seen to be 

in direct conflict with each of the above established Biblical and 

historical facts. 

An application that is in clear conflict with both the Bible and 

such historical facts cannot have anything to do with reality. In a 

serious discussion of possible applications of the seventy years, this 

alternative is the first which must be rejected. It is held to by the Watch 

Tower Society, not because it can be supported by the Bible and 

historical facts, but because it is a necessary prerequisite for their 

calculation of the supposed 2,520 years of Gentile times, 607 

B.C.E.–1914 C.E. 

If their application of the seventy years is dropped, the Gentile 

times calculation leading to 1914 C.E. immediately proves false, 

together with all the prophetic claims and speculations that are tied 

to it. 

G-1: The use of “seventy” as a “round” number 

The conclusion arrived at in the above discussion is that Judah 

and a number of the surrounding nations became vassals to the 

king of Babylon soon after the battle of Carchemish in 605 B.C.E. 

Does this mean that the seventy-year period “for Babylon” must be 

applied to the period 605–539 B.C.E.? To this suggestion it may 

quite naturally be objected that the length of this period is not 

seventy, but a little more than sixty-six years, which is, of course, 

true. 

Many scholars argue, however, that the numeral “70” in the 

Bible often seems to be used as “a round number” It occurs fiftytwo 

times independently in the Old Testament, and is used with a 

variety of different meanings—for weights, lengths of 

measurements, numbers of people, periods of time, and so forth. 50 

In a discussion of the biblical use of the numeral “70,” which also 

includes extra-biblical occurrences, Dr. F. C. Fensham concludes:


It is quite probably used as a kind of symbolic figure, just like 

seven. With the usage of seven and seventy the ancient Semites 

tried to make a difference between a smaller symbolic figure and a 

larger one. 51 

When used of periods of time it might have been used as an 

appropriate period of punishment. In a building inscription of the 

Assyrian king Esarhaddon (680–667 B.C.E.), it is stated that the 

desolation of Babylon after its destruction by Sennacherib in 689 

B.C.E. should have lasted seventy years, but the god Marduk in his 

mercy changed the period to eleven years. 52 A few decades earlier 

Isaiah predicted that “Tyre must be forgotten seventy years, the 

same as the days of one king.” (Isaiah 23:15) The explanation that the 

seventy years should be understood as “the same as the days of one 

king” is often interpreted to mean a normal life-span of a king, or 

“the full span of human life,” in accordance with Psalm 90:10, 

where the number seventy clearly is not meant to be viewed as a 

precise figure. 

Thus it is quite possible and perhaps probable that the seventy 

years of servitude predicted by Jeremiah were used as a round 

number. Such an understanding could also be supported by the fact 

that not all the nations surrounding Judah (some of which are 

obviously enumerated in Jeremiah 25:19–26) seem to have been 

made vassals to the king of Babylon at the same time, in 605 B.C.E. 

Some of them seem to have been brought into subjection 

somewhat later. The period of servitude, therefore, was not of 

exactly the same duration for all these nations. Yet the prophet said 

that all of them were to serve the king of Babylon “seventy years.” 

G-2: The seventy years ‘for Babylon”: 609–539 B.C.E. 

Although it is true that the servitude of a number of nations turned 

out to be somewhat less than seventy years, the prophecy does not 

50 Some examples are: 70 years (Gen. 5:12; 11:26; Ps. 90:10); 70 days (Gen. 50:3); 70 

descendants of Jacob (Gen. 46; Ex. 1:5; Deut. 10:22); 70 palm trees (Ex. 15:27); 70 

elders (Ex. 24:1; Num. 11:16; Ezek. 8:11); 70 submissive Canaanite kings (Judg. 

1:7); 70 sons (Judg. 8:30; 12:14; 2 Kings 10:1). 

51 F. C. Fensham, “The Numeral Seventy in the Old Testament and the Family of 

Jerubbaal, Ahab, Panammuwa and Athirat,” Palestine Exploration Quarterly July– 

December 1977, pp. 113–115. Cf. also Eric Burrows, “The Number Seventy in 

Semitic” Orientalia, Vol. V,1936, pp. 389–92. 

52 The inscription says: “Seventy years as the period of its desolation he wrote (down 

in the Book of Fate). But the merciful Marduk—his anger 1asted but a moment— 

turned (the Book of Fate) upside down and ordered its restoration in the eleventh 

year.” — D. D. Luekenbill, Ancient Records of Assyria and Babylonia, Vol.II 

(Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1927), p. 243. As pointed out by 

Luckenbill, “the Babylonian numeral 70,’ turned upside down or reversed, 

becomes ‘11,’ just as our printed ‘9,’ turned upside down, becomes ‘6.e “ (Ibid., p. 

242. Cf. also R. Borger in Journal of Near Eastern Studies, Vol. XVII, 1958, p.74.) 

In this way Esarhaddon “explained” his decision to restore Babylon after the death 

of his father Sennacherib in 681 B.C.E.


clearly imply that the seventy years “for Babylon” should be 

reckoned from 605 B.C.E. It must be remembered that all nations 

were predicted to become servants of Babylon: “all the nations must 

serve him and his son and his grandson.” 53 (Jeremiah 27:7, NW) 

Some nations had become subject to Babylon even prior to the battle 

of Carchemish in 605 B.C.E. If the seventy years “for Babylon” are 

counted from the time when Babylon crushed the Assyrian empire, 

thus beginning to step forward as the dominant political power 

itself, even a more exact application of the seventy years is possible. 

A short review of the last years of Assyria will make this clear. 

Up to 627 B.C.E. Assyria held hegemony over many countries, 

including Babylonia and the Hattu-area. But on the death of 

Ashurbanipal in that year, Assyria’s power began to wane. 

Nabopolassar, the governor of southern Babylonia, drove the 

Assyrians from Babylon in 626 and occupied the throne. In the 

following years he successfully established Babylonian 

independence. 

The most important source for the history of the final years of 

the Assyrian empire is the Babylonian chronicle B.M. 21901, which 

describes the events from the tenth year of Nabopolassar until the 

beginning of his eighteenth regnal year, that is, from 616 to 608 

B.C.E. 

53 Nebuchanezzar’s son and successor was Evil-Merodach. His grandson was 

evidently Belshazzar, the son of Nabonidus who, according to R. P. Dougherty was 

married to Nitocris, a daughter of Nebuchadnezzar.—R. P. Dougherty, Nabonidus 

and Belshazzar (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1929), pp. 30–32, 79. See also 

the comments by D. J. Wiseman, Nebuchadrezzar and Babylon (Oxford: Oxford 

University Press, 1985), pp. 11–12.


In 616, Nabopolassar attacked the Assyrians and defeated them, 

but an Egyptian army led by Psammetichus I came up to assist the 

Assyrian king (Sin-shar-ishkun), and Nabopolassar chose to 

withdraw to Babylon. 

By this time the Medes, too, began to attack Assyria, and in 614 

they took Ashur, the ancient Assyrian capital. After the city had 

fallen, Nabopolassar, whose army arrived too late to help the 

Medes, made a treaty with the Median ruler, Cyaxares. 

In 612, the two allies attacked the Assyrian capital, Nineveh, 

captured it and destroyed it. The Assyrian king, Sin-shar-ishkun, 

perished in the flames. His successor, Ashur-uballit II, fled to the 

provincial capital of Harran, where he established his government, 

still claiming sovereignty over Assyria. 

During the subsequent years Nabopolassar successfully 

campaigned in Assyria, and by the end of 610, he marched against 

Harran, joined by Median forces. 54 Ashur-uballit fled, and the city 

was captured and plundered either late in 610 or early in 609 

B.C.E. 55 Late in the summer of 609 Ashur-uballit, supported by a 

large Egyptian force headed by Pharaoh Necho, made a last 

attempt to recapture Harran, but failed. This definitely put an end 

to the Assyrian empire. 

That 609 B.C.E. marked the definite end of the Assyrian empire 

is the prevailing view among leading authorities today. Some typical 

statements are quoted in the following box: 

THE FALL OF ASSYRIA — 609 B.C.E. 

”In 610 the Babylonians and their allies took Harran, and 

Ashur-uballit with the wreckage of his forces fell back across the 

Euphrates into the arms of the Egyptians. An attempt (in 609) to 

retake Harran failed miserably. Assyria was finished.”— Professor 

John Bright, A History of Israel, 3rd ed. (Philadelphia: Westminster 

Press, 1981), p. 316. 

In 609 B.C.E. “Assyria ceased to exist and her territory was 

taken over by the Babylonians.”— Professor D. J. Wiseman in The 

54 The term used for the Medes in the chronicle, “Umman-manda,” has often been 

taken to refer to, or at least include, the Scythian. This hypothesis appears to be 

untenable in the light of recent research. See the extensive discussion by Stefan 

Zawadzki in The Fall of Assyria and Median-Babylonian Relations in Light of the 

Nabopolassar Chronicle (Poznan: Adam Mickiewicz University Press, 1988), pp. 64– 

98. 

55 According to the Babylonian chronicle BM 21901 the two armies set out against 

Harran in Arahsamnu, the eighth month, which in 610 B.C.E. roughly 

corresponded to November in the Julian calendar. After the capture of the city they 

returned home in Addaru, the twelfth month, which roughly corresponded to 

March in the following year, 609 B.C.E. Most probably, therefore, the city was 

captured early in 609 B.C.E.—A.K. Grayson, Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles 

(Locust Valley, N.Y.: JJ. Augustin Publisher, 1975), pp. 95–96.


New Bible Dictionary, J. D. Douglas (ed.), 2nd ed. (Leicester, 

England: Inter-Varsity Press, 1982), p. 101. 

”In 609, the Babylonians finally routed the Assyrians and began 

the establishment of their control over Phoenicia, Syria and 

Palestine.”—The Russian Assyriologist M. A. Dandamaev in History 

of Humanity, Vol. III, ed. by J. Herrman & E. Zürcher (Paris, 

London, New York: UNESCO, 1996), p. 117. 

”In 609 Assyria was mentioned for the last time as a still existing 

but marginal formation in northwestern Mesopotamia. After that 

year Assyria ceased to exist.”—Stefan Zawadzki in The Fall of 

Assyria (Poznan: Adam Mickiewicz University Press, 1988), p. 16. 

Thus, the seventy years “for Babylon” may also be reckoned 

from 609 B.C.E. From that year the Babylonian king regarded 

himself as the legitimate successor of the king of Assyria, and in the 

following years he gradually took over the control of the latter’s 

territories, beginning with a series of campaigns in the Armenian 

mountains north of Assyria. 

The Egyptian Pharaoh, Necho, after the failed attempt to 

recapture Harran in 609, succeeded in taking over the areas in the 

west, including Palestine, for about four years, although his control 

of these areas seems to have been rather general and loose. 56 But 

the battle at Carchemish in 605 B.C.E. put an end to this brief 

Egyptian presence in the west. (Jeremiah 46:2) After a series of 

successful campaigns to “Hattu,” Nebuchadnezzar made it clear to 

Necho that he was the real heir to the Assyrian Empire, and “never 

again did the king of Egypt come out from his land, for the king of 

Babylon had taken all that happened to belong to the king of Egypt 

up to the river of Euphrates.”―2 Kings 24:7, NW. 57 

If the Babylonian supremacy is reckoned from 609 B.C.E., the 

year that marked the definite end of the Assyrian Empire, exactly 

seventy years elapsed up to the fall of Babylon in 539 B .C.E. This 

period may be counted as the “seventy years for Babylon.” 

(Jeremiah 29:10) 58 

As not all the nations previously ruled by Assyria were brought 

under the Babylonian yoke in that same year, the “seventy years” of 

servitude in reality came to mean a round number for individual 

nations . 59 

56 Compare 2 Kings 23:29–34; 2 Chronicles 35:20–36:4. On Necho’s “general, but 

1oose” control of the areas in the west, see the comments by T. G. H. James in The 

Cambridge Ancient History, Vol. III:2 (see note 23 above), p. 716. 

57 Ross E. Winkle, too, concludes that “the defeat of Assyria is the obvious choice for 

the actua1 beginning of the seventy years. This is because of the fact that with 

Assyria out of the way, Babylon was truly the dominant power in the North.”—R. 

E. Winkle,


”Jeremiah’s seventy years for Babylon: a re-assessment,” Andrews University 

Seminary Studies (AUSS),Vol.25:3 (1987), p. 296. Winkle’s discussion of the texts 

dealing with the seventy years (in AUSS 25:2, pp. 201–213, and 25:3, pp. 289–299) 

is remarkably similar to that published already in the first edition of the present 

work in 1983. Winkle does not refer to it, however, and it is quite possible that it 

was not known to him. 

58 Several historians and biblical scholars have been amazed at the exactness with 

which Jeremiah’s prediction was fulfilled. Some scholars have tried to explain this 

by suggesting that the passages in Jer. 25:11 and 29:10 were added to the book of 

Jeremiah after the Jewish exile. There is no evidence in support of this theory, 

however. Professor John Bright, for example, commenting on Jer. 29:10, says: 

“One cannot explain rationally why it was that Jeremiah was assured that 

Babylon’s rule would be so relatively brief. But there is no reason to regard the 

verse as a vaticinium ex eventu [a ‘prophecy’ made after the event]; we can only 

record the fact that the prediction turned out to be approximately correct (which 

may be why later writers made so much of it). From the fall of Nineveh (612) to the 

fall of Babylon (539) was seventy-three years; from Nebuchadnezzar’s accession 

(605) to the fall of Babylon was sixty-six years.” —John Bright, The Anchor Bible: 

Jeremiah (Garden City, New York: Doubleday and Company, Inc., 2nd. ed. 1986), 

pp. 208–09. 

59 Interestingly, the Watch Tower writers, too, seem finally to have realized this. 

Commenting on the 70 years that Tyre would be forgotten according to Isaiah 

23:15–17—a period they equate with the 70 years for Babylon—their recent 

commentary on Isaiah says: “True, the island-city of Tyre is not subject to Babylon 

for a full 70 years, since the Babylonian Empire falls in 539 B.C.E. Evidently, the 

70 years represent the period of Babylonia’s greatest domination . . . Different 

nations come under that domination at different times. But at the end of 70 years, 

that domination will crumble.” (Isaiah’s Prophecy. Light for All Mankind, Vol 1, 

2000, p. 253) These remarkable statements are more or less a reversal of earlier 

views.

6 

I 

THE “SEVEN TIMES” OF DANIEL 4 

N THE PREVIOUS chapter it was shown that the prophecy of 

the seventy years may be given an application that is in full 

agreement with a dating of the desolation of Jerusalem in 587 

B.C.E. Would this mean , then , that a period of 2,520 years of 

Gentile times started in 587 B.C.E. and ended—not in 1914―but 

in 1934 C.E.? Or could it be that the 2,520-year calculation is not 

founded on a sound biblical basis after all? If not, what meaning 

should be attached to the outbreak of war in 1914―a year that had 

been pointed forward to decades in advance? 

These are the questions discussed in this chapter. We will first 

take a look at the attempts made to end the Gentile times in 1934. 

A. THE 1934 PROPHECY 

Ending the times of the Gentiles in 1934 would not be a new idea. 

As far back as 1886 the British expositor Dr. Henry Grattan 

Guinness pointed to 1934 in his book Light for the Last Days. 1 Dr. 

Guinness made use of three different calendars in his calculations 

and thus succeeded in giving the Gentile times three time periods 

of different lengths: 2,520, 2,484, and 2,445 years respectively. In 

addition, he also used several starting-points, the first in 747 and 

the last in 587 B.C.E. 2 This provided a series of terminal dates, 

extending from 1774 CE. to 1934 CE., all of which were regarded 

as important dates in God’s prophetic timetable. 

With the 1934 date, however, the Gentile times would definitely 

end, reckoned according to Dr. Guinness’ longest scale and from 

his last starting-point. The four most important dates in his scheme 

were 1915, 1917, 1923 and 1934. 

1. H. Grattan Guinness, Light for the Last Days (London, 1886). 

2. The others were 741, 738, 727, 713, 676, 650–647, and 598. 

236

The “Seven Times” of Daniel 237 

Dr. Guinness had predicted that the year 1917 would be perhaps 

the most important year in the termination of the trampling of 

Jerusalem. When the British general Edmund Allenby on 

December 9 that year captured Jerusalem and freed Palestine from 

the Turkish domination, this was seen by many as a confirmation 

of his chronology. Quite a number of people interested in the 

prophecies began to look forward to 1934 with great expectations. 3 

Among these were also some of the followers of Pastor Charles 

Taze Russell. 

A-1: Pastor Russell’s chronology emended 

At the climax of the organizational crisis in the Watch Tower 

Society following the death of Russell in 1916, many Bible students 

left the parent movement and formed the Associated Bible Students, in 

1918 chartered as The Pastoral Bible Institute. 4 

In the same year Paul S. L. Johnson broke away from this group 

and formed The Laymen’s Home Missionary Movement, today one of 

the strongest groups to grow out of the Bible Student movement 

aside from the parent organization. 

Early in the 1920s the Pastoral Bible Institute changed Russell’s 

application of the Gentile times, which caused an interesting debate 

between that movement, the Laymen’s Home Missionary 

Movement, and the Watch Tower Society. 

An article entitled “Watchman, What of the Night?” published in 

the Pastoral Bible Institute’s periodical The Herald of Christ’s 

Kingdom, April 15, 1921, marked a significant break with Pastor 

Russell’s chronological system. Mainly responsible for this 

reevaluation was R. E. Streeter, one of the five editors of the 

Herald. His views, accepted by the other editors, reflected a 

growing concern on the part of many Bible Students (as evidenced 

from letters received from nearly every part of the earth) who had 

experienced deep perplexity “as to the seeming failure of much that 

was hoped for and expected would be realized by the Lord’s people 

by this time.” 5 Some of the questions which had arisen were: 

3 Most of these expositors seemed to be unaware of the fact that Guinness himself 

back in 1909, in his book On the Rock, had revised his chronology and “had 

calculated that the end would occur in 1945 instead of 1934.”—Dwight Wilson, 

Armageddon Now! (Tyler, Texas: Institute for Christian Economics, 1991), pp. 90– 

91. 

4 The Pastoral Bible Institute (P.B.I.) was headed by former board members of the 

Watch Tower Society who were illegally dismissed by J. F. Rutherford in 1917 

together with other prominent members. 

5. The Herald of Christ’s Kingdom, April 15, 1921, p. 115.


Why has not the Church realized her final deliverance and 

reward by this time? . . . Why is not the time of trouble over with 

by now — why has not the old order of things passed away, and 

why has not the Kingdom been established in power before this? 

Is it not possible that there may be an error in the chronology? 6 

Calling attention to the fact that Pastor Russell’s predictions for 

1914 had not been fulfilled, it was concluded that there was 

evidently an error in the former reckoning. This error was 

explained to be found in the calculation of the times of the 

Gentiles: 

Careful investigation has resulted in our locating the point of 

difficulty or discrepancy in what we have considered our great 

chain of chronology. It is found to be in connection with the 

commencement of the ‘Times of the Gentiles’. 7 

First, it was argued, the seventy years, formerly referred to as a 

period of desolation, more properly should be called “the seventy 

years of servitude.” (Jeremiah 25:11) Then, referring to Daniel 2:1, 

37–38, it was pointed out that Nebuchadnezzar was the “head of 

gold” already in his second regnal year, and actually dominated the 

other nations including Judah, beginning from his very first year, 

according to Daniel 1:1. Consequently, the era of seventy years 

commenced eighteen to nineteen years before the destruction of 

Jerusalem. This destruction, therefore, had to be moved forward 

about nineteen years, from 606 to 587 B.C.E. 

But the 606 B.C.E. date could still be retained as a starting-point 

for the times of the Gentiles, as it was held that the lease of power to 

the Gentiles started with Nebuchadnezzar’s rise to world 

dominion. Thus 1914 marked the end of the lease of power, but not 

necessarily the full end of the exercise of power, nor the complete fall 

of the Gentile governments, even as the kingdom of Judah did not 

fall and was not overthrown in the final and absolute sense until 

Zedekiah, a vassal king under Nebuchadnezzar, was taken captive 

nineteen years after the period of servitude began. The Herald 

editors concluded: 

Accordingly it was 587 B.C. when Zedekiah was taken captive, 

and not 606 B.C., and hence while the 2520 years’ 1ease of 

Gentile power starting in Nebuchadnezzar’s first year, 606 B.C., 

would run out in 1914; yet the full end of the Gentile Times and 

6 Ibid., pp. 115, 116. 

7 Ibid., p. 118.


the complete fall of Gentile governments is not indicated as taking 

place till nineteen years later, or in about 1934. 8 

So what could be expected to take place in 1934? The Herald of 

Christ’s Kingdom indicated: 

The reasonable deduction is that the great changes and events 

which we have heretofore expected to take place in 1914 would, in 

view of the foregoing, be logically expected to be in evidence 

somewhere around 1934. 9 

Other articles followed in the issues of May 15 and June 1 of 

the Herald, giving additional evidence for the necessity of these 

changes and answering questions from the readers. The changes 

evoked much interest among the Bible Students: 

Many have freely written us that they have heartily accepted the 

conclusions reached. . . . 

It has been of special interest to us to receive advice from 

brethren in several different quarters telling of how for some 

months or years before receiving our recent treatment of the 

subject, they had been led to make an exhaustive examination of 

the chronology and had arrived at exactly the same conclusions as 

those presented in the HERALD with regard to the 19 years 

difference in the starting of the Gentile Times , and found that all 

the evidences showed that Nebuchadnezzar’s universal kingdom 

began in his first year instead of his nineteenth. 10 

A-2: The Bible Student controversy on the Gentile times 

chronology 

However, most Bible Student groups rejected the conclusions of 

the Pastoral Bible Institute. The first counterattack came from P. S. 

L. Johnson, the founder of the Laymen’s Home Missionary 

Movement and editor of its periodical The Present Truth. 

8 Ibid., p. 120. 

9 Ibid. 

10 The Herald of Christ’s Kingdom, June 1, 1921, p. 163. Interestingly, the November 

1, 1921 issue of the Herald published an article prepared by another Bible Student 

in 1915, in which he presented evidence and conclusions practically identical to 

those of R. E. Streeter, although he dated the destruction of Jerusalem in 588 

instead of 587 B.C.E. The 588 date was adopted by P.B.I. in subsequent issues of 

the Herald. As this man had no connection with P.B.I., he preferred to be 

anonymous, signing the article with the initials J.A.D. The Beraean Bible Institute, 

a Bible Student group with headquarters in Melbourne, Australia, also accepted 

the conclusions of the P.B.I. editors, as seen from their People’s Paper of July 1 

and September 1, 1921, pp. 52, 68.


Periodicals published by the three principal Bible Student groups 

involved in the controversy in the early 1920’s about the 

application of the Gentile times.


In the issue of June 1, 1921, he published a critical article entitled 

“‘Watchman, What of the Night?’ —Examined” (pages 87–93), in 

which he defended Pastor Russell’s understanding of Daniel 1:1 

and 2:1 and the seventy years of desolation, also adding some 

arguments of his own. This was followed by other articles in the 

issues of July 1 and September 1. 11 

In 1922, the Watch Tower Society, too, plunged into the debate. 

Evidently the chronological changes in the Herald rapidly came to 

the knowledge of many Bible Students from different quarters, and 

seem to have caused no little agitation among the readers of The 

Watch Tower magazine, too. This was openly admitted in the first 

article on the subject, “The Gentile Times,” published in the May 

1, 1922, issue of The Watch Tower: 

About a year ago there began some agitation concerning 

chronology, the crux of the argument being that Brother Russell 

was wrong concerning chronology and particularly in error with 

reference to the Gentile times. . . . 

Agitation concerning the error in chronology has continued to 

increase throughout the year, and some have turned into positive 

opposition to that which has been written. This has resulted in 

some of the Lord’s dear sheep becoming disturbed in mind and 

causing them to inquire, Why does not THE WATCH TOWER 

say something? 12 

Consequently, beginning with this article, the Watch Tower 

Society started a series in defense of Pastor Russell’s chronology. 

The second article, entitled “Chronology,” published in The Watch 

Tower of May 15, 1922, opened with a reaffirmation of belief in 

Russell’s dates, and added the date 1925: 

We have no doubt whatever in regard to the chronology relating 

to the dates of 1874, 1914, 1918, and 1925. Some claim to have 

found new light in connection with the period of “seventy years of 

desolation” and Israel’s captivity in Babylon, and are zealously 

seeking to make others believe that Brother Russell was in error. 

11 “‘Ancient Israel’s Jubilee Year’ Examined” in the July 1, 1921 issue Of The Present 

Truth, pp. 100–104, and “Further P.B.I. Chronology Examined” in the September 1 

issue, pp. 134–136. 

12 The Watch Tower, May 1, 1922, pp. 131–132. Other articles published during 1922 

were “Chronology” (May 15, pp. 147–150), “Seventy Years’ Desolation (Part I)” 

(June 1, pp. 163–168), “Seventy Years’ Desolation (Part II)” (June 15, pp. 183–187), 

“The Strong Cable Of Chronology” (July 15, pp. 217–219), “Interesting Letters: 

Mistakes of Ptolemy, the Pagan Historian” (August 15, pp. 253–254; this was 

written by Morton Edgar), and “Divinely-given Chronological Parallelisms (Part I)” 

(November 15, pp. 355–360).


The arguments put forth in this and subsequent articles were much 

the same as those earlier published by Paul S. L. Johnson. Johnson, 

who involuntarily had to side with the Watch Tower Society in this 

“battle,” supported The Watch Tower with a series of new articles in 

the Present Truth, running parallel with the articles in The Watch 

Tower. 13 

These responses were not long left unanswered. The Herald of 

June 15, 1922, contained the article “The Validity of Our 

Chronological Deductions,” which was a refutation of the 

arguments put forth in support of Pastor Russell’s interpretation of 

Daniel 1:1 and 2:1. In the July 1 issue, a second article “Another 

Chronological Testimony” considered the evidence from Zechariah 

7:5, and the July 15 issue contained a third on the desolation 

period, again signed by J.A.D. (See note 10.) 

Gradually the debate subsided. The Pastoral Bible Institute 

editors summarized their arguments and published them in a 

special double number of the Herald, August 1–15, 1925, and, 

again, in the May 15, 1926 issue. Then they waited to see what the 

1934 date would bring. 

As 1934 approached the Institute’s editors assumed a very 

cautious attitude: 

If the nineteen years was intended to indicate the exact length 

of time of the running out of the Gentile Times from 1915 

onward, then that would carry us to approximately 1933–1934; but 

we do not know that this was so intended, nor do we have positive 

evidence as to the exact length of the closing out of the Gentile 

Times beyond 1915. 14 

This cautiousness proved to be wise, and when the 1934 date 

had passed, they could assert: 

Brethren who have perused carefully the pages of this journal, 

are well aware that much cautiousness and conservatism have been 

urged upon all in the direction of setting dates and fixing the time 

for various occurrences and events; and this continues to be the 

editorial policy of the ‘Herald’. 15 

As to the question of why 1934 did not see the passing away of 

the Gentile nations, it was explained that 1934 should be looked 

13 The Present Truth, June 1, 1922: “Some Recent P.B.I. Teachings Examined” (pp. 

84–87); July 1: “Some Recent P.B.I. Teachings Examined” (pp. 102–108); August 1: 

“Further P.B.I. Chronology Examined” (pp.117–122); November 1: “Some Mistakes 

in Ptolemy’s Canon” (pp. 166–168). 

14 The Herald of Christ’s Kingdom, May I, 1930, p. 137. 

15 The Herald of Christ’s Kingdom, May, 1935, p. 68.


upon as an approximate date, and that “we believe the progress of 

events and all the facts as we see them unfolding before us in this 

day of the Lord, lead us to look for the running out of the present 

order more by degrees or stages rather than that of the sudden 

crash and passing away of everything at one point of time, as the 

Apostle Paul suggests — ‘As travail upon a woman’. ”16 The 

worsening situation in the world leading to The Second World War 

seemed to give support to this way of looking at the matter. 17 

The years 1914 and 1934 have come and gone, and the Gentile 

nations still rule the earth. In fact, the number of independent 

nations has tripled since 1914, from 66 in that year to about 200 at 

present. Thus, instead of ending in 1914, the times for the majority 

of nations on earth today have begun after that year! 

Some proper questions to ask now surely are: Is the 2,520-year 

period really a well-founded biblical calculation? Was Jesus’ 

mention of the “Gentile times” at Luke 21:24 a reference to 

Nebuchadnezzar’s “seven times” of madness? And should these 

“seven times” be converted into 2,520 years? 

B. ARE THE GENTILE TIMES “SEVEN TIMES” OF 2,520 

YEARS? 

When Jesus, at Luke 21:24, referred to the “times of the Gentiles,” 

or, according to the New World Translation, “the appointed times of 

the nations,” did he then have in mind the “seven times” of 

madness that fell upon the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar in 

fulfillment of his dream about the chopped-down tree, as recorded 

in the book of Daniel, chapter four? And were these “seven times” 

of madness meant to have a greater fulfillment beyond that upon 

Nebuchadnezzar, representing a period of 2,520 years of Gentile 

dominion? 

In spite of the fanciful arguments put forth in support of these 

conjectures, positive proof is missing, and serious objections may 

be raised against them. A critical examination of the Watch Tower 

Society’s chief arguments, as presented in its Bible dictionary Insight 

on the Scriptures, will make this abundantly clear. 18 

16 Ibid., p. 69. 

17 The year 1934 was still held to be an important date, occupying “a prominent place 

in chronological prophecy.” In support of this conclusion, the P.B.I. editors referred 

to a statement by Edwin C. Hill, a press reporter of international reputation, to the 

effect that “the year 1934 had been a most remarkable one. There had been many 

important occurrences and developments, he said, affecting the destinies of all the 

nations of the earth and marking the year as one of the most significant of 

history.”—The Herald of Christ’s Kingdom, May, 1935, pp. 71–72. (Emphasis 

added) 

18 See the article “Appointed times of the nations,” in Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 1 

(Brooklyn, New York: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 1988), pp. 132–135.


B-1: The supposed connection between Luke 21:24 and 

Daniel 4 

It is true that in his last great prophecy (Matthew 24–25; Luke 

21, and Mark 13), Jesus “at least twice” referred to the book of 

Daniel. 19 

Thus, when mentioning the “disgusting thing that causes 

desolation” (NW) he directly states that this was “spoken of 

through Daniel the prophet.” (Matthew 24:15; Daniel 9:27; 11:31, 

and 12:11) And when speaking of the “great tribulation [Greek 

thlipsis] such as has not occurred since the world’s beginning until 

now” (Matthew 24:21, NW), he clearly quotes from Daniel 12:1: 

“And there will certainly occur a time of distress [the early Greek 

translations―the Septuagint version and Theodotion’s version―use 

the word thlipsis, in the same way as in Matthew 24:21] such as has 

not been made to occur since there came to be a nation until that 

time.” (NW) 

However, no such clear reference to chapter four of Daniel may be found 

at Luke 21:24. The word “times” (Greek kairoí, the plural form of 

kairós) in this text is no clear reference to the “seven times” of 

Daniel 4 as the Watch Tower Society maintains. 20 

This common word occurs many times in both its singular and 

plural forms in the Greek Scriptures, and about 300 times in the 

Greek Septuagint translation of the Hebrew Scriptures. In Daniel 4 

and Luke 21 the word “times” is explicitly applied to two quite 

different periods—the “seven times” to the period of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s madness, and the “times of the Gentiles” to the 

period of the trampling down of Jerusalem―and the two periods 

may be equalized only by giving them a greater application beyond 

that given in the texts themselves. Therefore, the supposed 

connection between the “times of the Gentiles” at Luke 21:24 and 

the “seven times” at Daniel 4:16, 23, 25, and 32 appears to be no 

more than a conjecture. 

B-2: The greater application of the “seven times” 

Several arguments are proposed by the Watch Tower Society to 

support the conclusion that Nebuchadnezzar’s “seven times” of 

madness prefigured the period of Gentile dominion up to the 

establishment of Christ’s Kingdom, viz., a) the prominent element of 

time in the book of Daniel; b) the time at which the vision of the 

chopped-down tree was given; c) the person to whom it was given, 

19 Ibid., p. 133. 

20 Ibid.


and d) the theme of the vision. Let us have a closer look at these 

arguments. 

a) The element of time in the book of Daniel 

To prove that the “seven times” of Daniel 4 are related to the 

“times of the Gentiles,” the Watch Tower Society argues that “an 

examination of the entire book of Daniel reveals that the element 

of time is everywhere prominent in the visions and prophecies it 

presents,” and that “the book repeatedly points toward the 

conclusion that forms the theme of its prophecies: the 

establishment of a universal and eternal Kingdom of God exercised 

through the rulership of the ‘son of man’.’’ 21 

Although this is true of some of the visions in the book of 

Daniel, it is not true of all of them. And as far as can be seen, no 

other vision or prophecy therein has more than one fulfillment. 22 

There is nothing to indicate, either in the book of Daniel or 

elsewhere in the Bible, that Nebuchadnezzar’s dream of the 

chopped-down tree in Daniel 4 has more than one fulfillment. 

Daniel clearly says that the prophecy was fulfilled upon 

Nebuchadnezzar: “All this befell Nebuchadnezzar the king” 

(Daniel 4:28, NW). And further, in verse 33: “At that moment the 

word itself was fulfilled upon Nebuchadnezzar.” (NW) Dr. Edward 

J. Young comments: 

lit., was ended, i.e., it came to an end in that it was completed or 

fulfilled with respect to Neb.” 23 

21 Ibid., pp. 133–34. 

22 When Jesus, in his prophecy on the desolation of Jerusalem, twice referred to the 

prophecies of Daniel (Matthew 24:15, 21), he did not give these prophecies a 

second and “greater” fulfillment. His first reference was to the “disgusting thing 

that is causing desolation,” a phrase found in Daniel 9:27; 11:31, and 12:11. The 

original text is that of Daniel 9:27, which contextually (verse 26) seems to point 

forward to the crisis culminating with the desolation of Jerusalem in 70 C.E. The 

same holds true of his reference to the “great tribulation” of Daniel 12:1. Jesus 

applied, not reapplied, both of these prophecies to the tribulation on the Jewish 

nation in 67–70 C.E. Phrases and expressions used by earlier prophets are often 

also used, or alluded to, by later prophets, not because they gave a second and 

greater application to an earlier, fulfilled prophecy, but because they readily 

reused the “prophetic language” of earlier prophets, using similar phrases, 

expressions, ideas, symbols, metaphors, etc. in their prophecies of events to come. 

Thus, for example, it has often been pointed out that the apostle Paul, in his 

description of the coming “man of lawlessness” (2 Thessalonians 2:35), borrows 

some of the expressions used by Daniel in his prophecies about the activities of 

Antiochus IV Epiphanes (cf. Daniel 8:10–11; 11:36–37). 

23 Edward J. Young, The Prophecy of Daniel (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publ. 

Co., 1949), p. 110.


Actually, most of the chapters in the book of Daniel do not 

contain material that could be said to point forward toward “the 

establishment of a universal eternal kingdom of God through the 

rulership of the ‘son of man’ “: chapter 1 deals with Daniel and his 

companions at the court of Babylon; chapter 3 tells the story about 

the three Hebrews in the fiery furnace; chapter 5 deals with 

Belshazzar’s feast, which ended with the fall of Babylon; chapter 6 

tells the story of Daniel in the den of lions, and chapter 8 contains 

the vision of the ram and the he-goat, which culminates with the 

end of the tyrannical rule of Antiochus IV, in the second century 

before Christ’s coming. 24 

And although the prophecy of the “seventy weeks” in chapter 9 

points forward to the coming of Messiah, it does not say anything 

about the establishment of his kingdom. Not even the lengthy 

prophecy in the fina1 chapters, Daniel 10–12, which end with the 

“great tribulation” and the resurrection of “many of those asleep in 

the ground” (Daniel 12:1–3), explicitly connects this with the 

establishment of the kingdom of Christ. 

The fact is that the only clear and direct references to the 

establishment of the kingdom of God are found in chapters 2 and 

7 (Daniel 2:44–45 and 7:13–14, 18, 22, 27). 25 

Thus any precedent which would call upon us to give a greater 

application to Nebuchadnezzar’s “seven times” of madness simply 

does not exist. 

b) The time of the vision 

If, as claimed, the time at which this vision was given should 

indicate a greater fulfillment, pointing to a 2,520-year break in the 

royal dynasty of David, it should have been given close to, or 

24 This is how the vision is understood by most commentators. The statements at 

Daniel 8:17 and 19 that “the vision pertains to the time of the end” should not 

automatically be understood as a reference to a final, eschatological “End of Time” 

In the Old Testament words and phrases such as “the day of the Lord,” the “end” 

(Hebrew qetz) and the “time of the end” (compare Amos 5:18–20, Ezekiel 7:1–6; 

21:25, 29; Daniel 11:13, 27,35, 40) “do not refer to an End of Time but rather to a 

divinely appointed crisis, a turning point in history, i.e., a point within historical 

time and not a post- or supra-historical date.” (Shemaryahu Talmon, Literaty 

Studies in the Hebrew Bible, Jerusalem-Leiden: The Magnes Press, 1993, p. 171) 

The attempt of Antiochus IV to destroy the Jewish religion, as predicted in Daniel 

8:9–14, 23–26, was certainly such a “crisis” and has often been described as a 

“turning point in history” See, for example, the comments by Al Walters in The 

Catholic Biblical Quarterly, Vol. 55:4, 1993, pp. 688–89. 

25 Compare the careful study of this question by Dr. Reinhard Gregor Kratz, “Reich 

Gottes und Gesetz im Danielbuch und im werdenden Judendom,” in A. S. van der 

Woude (ed.), The Book of Daniel in the Light of New Findings (Leuven, Belgien: 

Leuven University Press, 1993), pp. 433–479. (See especially pp. 441–442, and 

448.)


preferably in the same year as the dethronement of Zedekiah. 

Often, when the time a prophecy is given is important and has a 

connection with its fulfillment, the prophecy is dated. This is, for 

example, the case of the prophecy of the seventy years. (Jeremiah 

25:1) 26 The visions and prophecies in the book of Daniel are 

usually dated: the dream of the image in the second year of 

Nebuchadnezzar (Daniel 2:1), the vision of the four beasts in the 

first year of Belshazzar (Daniel 7:1), the vision of the ram and the 

he-goat in the third year of Belshazzar (Daniel 8:1), the prophecy of 

the seventy weeks in the first year of Darius the Mede (Daniel 9:1), 

and the last prophecy in the third year of Cyrus (Daniel 10:1). 27 

But no such date is given for the vision of the chopped-down tree in Daniel 

4, which should logically have been done if this was important. The 

only information concerning time is given in verse 29, where the 

fulfillment of the dream is stated to have occurred twelve months 

later. Although no regnal year is given, it seems probable that 

Nebuchadnezzar’s “seven times” of madness took place 

somewhere near the close of his long reign. The reason for this 

conclusion is the boastful statement that triggered off the 

fulfillment of his dream: 

Is not this Babylon the Great, that I myself have built for the 

royal house with the strength of my might and for the dignity of 

my majesty? —Daniel 4:30, NW. 

When could Nebuchadnezzar possibly have uttered these words? 

Throughout most of his long reign he engaged in numerous 

building projects at Babylon and many other cities in Babylonia. 

The cuneiform inscriptions demonstrate that Nebuchadnezzar was 

26 See chapter 5 above, section A-3. 

27 That at least some dates given for the visions of Daniel are closely related to their 

contents may be seen from chapters 7 and 8, dated to the 1st and 3rd years of 

Belshazzar, respectively. According to the “Verse Account of Nabonidus” (B .M. 

38299), Nabonidus “entrusted the kingship” to his son Belshazzar “when the third 

year was about to begin.” (J. B. Pritchard, Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to 

the Old Testament, Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1950, pp. 

312–13) As the 1st year of Nabonidus was 555/54 BCE, his 3rd year—and thus 

the 1st year of Belshazzar—was 553/52 BCE. Now, according to the Sippar 

Cylinder, it was in this very year, the 3rd year of Nabonidus, that the god Marduk 

“aroused” Cyrus in a rebellion against his Median overlord, king Astyages. As 

stated in the Nabonidus Chronicle, Astyages was finally defeated three years later, 

in the 6th year of Nabonidus, that is, in 550/49 BCE. It can hardly be a 

coincidence that Daniel shortly before this, in Belshazzar’s 3 rd year(Daniel 8:1), 

that is, in 551/50 BCE, was transferred in a vision to Susa, the future 

administrative capital of Persia, to be shown the emergence of the Medo-Persian 

empire in the form of a two-horned ram “making thrusts to the west and to the 

north and to the south?’ (Daniel 8:1–4, 20) His vision, then, began to be fulfilled 

probably just a few months after it was given!


Nebuchadnezzar’s madness 

as depicted in the book “The Truth Shall Make You Free,” (New 

York: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, Inc., 1943), page 237.


primarily a builder, not a warrior. He renovated and restored 

sixteen temples in Babylon including the two temples of Marduk, 

completed the two great walls of the city, built a network of canals 

across the city, embellished the streets of Babylon, rebuilt the 

palace of Nabopolassar, his father, and constructed another palace 

for his own use that was finished about 570 B.C.E., in addition to 

many other architectural achievements. 28 

It was evidently at the close of this building activity that the 

vision of the chopped-down tree was given, as is indicated by 

Nebuchadnezzar’s proud words in Daniel 4:30. This points 

towards the close of his forty-three-year-long reign, and 

consequently many years after the destruction of Jerusalem in his 

eighteenth regnal year. 

A prophecy is, by definition, forward looking. How then could 

the time at which the vision was given indicate anything about a 

greater fulfillment, one beginning with the dethronement of 

Zedekiah many years earlier? Should not the fulfillment of a prophecy 

start, not before, but subsequent to the time at which the prophecy is 

given? The time of this particular dream, therefore, does not only 

seem to be unimportant, as the prophecy is not dated, but can 

actually be used as an argument against an application to a period 

starting with the destruction of Jerusalem, as the dream evidently 

was given many years after that event. 

c) The person to whom the vision was given 

Does the person to whom this vision was given, that is 

Nebuchadnezzar, indicate it has to be applied to a supposed 2,520- 

year break in the royal dynasty of David? 

It is true that Nebuchadnezzar was instrumental in causing the 

break in this dynasty. But is it not improbable that 

Nebuchadnezzar’s oppressive exercise of sovereignty would be a 

symbol of Jehovah’s sovereignty expressed through the Davidic 

dynasty, while contemporaneously during the “seven times” of 

madness his total powerlessness was a symbol of world dominion 

exercised by Gentile nations? Or did he play two roles during his 

“seven times” of madness—(1) his powerlessness, representing the 

break in the dynasty of David during the 2,520-year period; and (2) 

his beastlike state, picturing the Gentile rule of the earth? 

28 D. J. Wiseman, Nebuchadrezzar and Babylon (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 

1985), pp. 42–80.


As may be seen, the parallels between the literal fulfillment and the 

claimed greater application are strained, and the greater application, 

therefore, becomes quite complicated and confusing. Would not 

this application have been far more probable if the vision had been 

given to one of the last kings of Judah instead of to 

Nebuchadnezzar? Would not a king of the royal dynasty of David 

be a more natural figure of that dynasty, and the “seven times” of 

loss of power experienced by such a king a more natural figure of 

the loss of sovereignty in the Davidic line? 

Evidently, then, the person to whom the vision was given is no clear 

indication of another application beyond that one given directly 

through Daniel the prophet. 

d) The theme of the vision 

The theme of the vision of the chopped-down tree is expressed in 

Daniel 4:17, namely, “that people living may know that the Most High is 

Ruler in the kingdom of mankind and that to the one he wants to, he gives it 

and he sets up over it even the lowliest one of mankind.” 

Does this stated intent of the vision indicate it pointed forward 

to the time for the establishment of God’s kingdom by his 

Christ? 29 

To draw such a conclusion would be to read more into this 

statement than it actually says. Jehovah has always been the 

supreme ruler in the kingdom of mankind, although his supremacy 

has not always been recognized by everyone. But David did realize 

this, saying: 

Jehovah himself has firmly established his throne in the very 

heavens; and over everything his own kingship has held dominion. — 

Psalms 103:19, NW. 

Your kingship is a kingship for all times indefinite, And your 

dominion is throughout all successive generations.― Psalms 

145:13, NW. 

Thus Jehovah has always exercised control over the history of 

mankind and maneuvered the events according to his own will: 

And he is changing times and seasons, removing kings and 

setting up kings, giving wisdom to the wise ones and knowledge to 

those knowing discernment. —Daniel 2:21, NW. 

This was a lesson that Nebuchadnezzar―as well as kings before 

and after him—had to learn. The period that followed upon 

Nebuchadnezzar’s desolation of Judah and Jerusalem represented 

no exception or interruption to Jehovah’s supreme rule, in spite of 

29 Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 1 (1988), p. 134.


the break in the royal dynasty of David. The Gentile nations during 

this period did not rule supremely. Jehovah took action against the 

Babylonian empire by raising up Cyrus to capture Babylon in 539 

B.C.E. (Isaiah 45:1), and later Alexander the Great destroyed the 

Persian empire. 

Further, the expression “lowliest one of mankind” at Daniel 

4:17 is no clear indication that Jesus Christ is intended, as Jehovah 

in his dealings with mankind many times has overthrown mighty 

and haughty kings and exalted lowly ones. 30 This was stressed 

centuries later by Mary, the mother of Jesus: 

He [God] has performed mightily with his arm, he has scattered 

abroad those who are haughty in the intention of their hearts. He 

has brought down men of power from thrones and exalted lowly 

ones. ― Luke 1:51–52, NW. 

Therefore, when the holy watcher in Nebuchadnezzar’s dream 

announced that “the Most High is Ruler in the kingdom of 

mankind and that to the one he wants to, he gives it and he sets up 

over it the lowliest one of mankind,” he simply seems to be stating 

a universal principle in Jehovah’s dealing with mankind. There is no 

indication that he is giving a prophecy concerning the establishment 

of the Messianic kingdom with Jesus Christ on the throne. The 

theme of this vision―that the Most High is ruler in the kingdom of 

mankind―is demonstrated by Jehovah’s dealing with the haughty 

Nebuchadnezzar who through his experience came to realize this 

universal principle. (Daniel 4:3, 34–37) By reading about 

Nebuchadnezzar’s humiliating experience, people living in every 

generation may come to realize this same truth. 

B-3: The collapsed foundation of the 2,520-year 

calculation 

As was shown in Chapter 1, the calculation that the “seven times” 

represented a period of 2,520 years is founded upon the so-called 

“year-day concept.” 

This concept is no longer accepted as a general principle by the 

Watch Tower Society. It was taken over by Pastor Russell from the 

Second Adventists, but was abandoned by the Society’s second 

30 Commenting on the statement at Daniel 4:17 that God gives the kingdom “to the 

one whom he wants to,” the Watch Tower Society states: “We know that this ‘one’ 

to whom the Most High chooses to give the ‘kingdom’ is Christ Jesus.”—True Peace 

and Security—From What Source? (Brooklyn, N.Y.: Watchtower Bible and Tract 

Society, 1973), p. 74.


president, J. F. Rutherford, in the 1920’s and early 1930’s. 31 The 

2,300 evenings and mornings (Dan. 8:14), and the 1,260, 1,290, and 

1,335 days (Daniel 12:7,11, 12; Revelation 11:2, 3; 12:6, 14), earlier 

held to be as many years, have since then been interpreted to mean 

days only. 

The two texts in the Bible which earlier were quoted in proof of 

the year-day principle (Numbers 14:34 and Ezekiel 4:6) are no 

longer understood as stating a universal principle of interpretation, 

although they are still cited in support of this particular 2,520-year 

calculation. As was shown in Chapter 1, note 2, it is not even likely 

that the year-day rule should be applied to the “seventy weeks” of 

Daniel 9:24–27. That prophecy does not speak of days, but 

“weeks” or, literally, “sevens.” So, rather than calling for a 

conversion of the “weeks” into days and then applying a “year-day 

principle,” the contextual connection with the “seventy years” at 

verse 2 strongly supports the prevalent conclusion that the angel 

was simply multiplying those seventy years by seven: “Seven times 

[or: sevenfold] seventy [years] are decreed.” 

Even the adherents of the year-day theory themselves find it 

impossible to be consistent in their application of the supposed 

“principle” that in biblical time-related prophecies days always mean 

years. For example, when God told Noah that “after seven more 

days, I will send rain on the earth forty days and forty nights” 

(Genesis 7:4, NASB), they do not interpret this to mean that “after 

seven more years, I wil1 send rain on the earth forty years” Or when 

Jonah told the inhabitants of Nineveh that “yet forty days and 

Nineveh will be overthrown” (Jonah 3:4), they do not understand 

this to mean that Nineveh should be overthrown after forty years. 

Many other examples could be given. 32 

To apply the year-day principle to the “seven times” of Daniel 4, 

then, is evidently quite arbitrary, and this is especially true if those 

doing the applying no longer apply that principle to other 

prophetic time periods. 

Like other adherents of the 2,520-year calculation, the Watch 

Tower Society argues that the “seven times” (the period of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s madness) are 2,520 days, because at Revelation 

12:6, 14 “a time and times and half a time” (3 1/2 times) are 

equated with 1,260 days. (The validity of this reasoning will be 

discussed in the section below.) But while the 2,520 days are 

interpreted to mean a period of 2,520 years, the 1,260 days are 

31 For a thorough refutation of the year-day concept, see pp. 111–126 of Samuel P. 

Tregelles , Remarks on the Prophetic Visions in the Book of Daniel, originally 

published in 1852. Reference here is to the seventh edition (London: The Sovereign 

Grace Advent Testimony, 1965). 

32 For additional examples, see Milton S. Terry, Biblical Hermeneutics (Grand Rapids: 

Academic Books, 1974; reprint of the 1883 edition), pp. 386–90.


understood to mean just 1260 literal days. As the interpretation of 

the “seven times” is derived from the three-and-a-half times (1260 

days), why is not a consistent interpretation given to both periods? 

How do we know that the supposed 2520 days mean years, but that 

this is not the case with the 1,260 days? 33 

Obviously there is no real basis for the conclusion that “seven 

times” mean 2,520 years. 

B-4: Were the “seven times” really seven years? 

Nebuchadnezzar’s “seven times” of madness are often understood 

as a period of seven years. However, anyone acquainted with the 

reign of Nebuchadnezzar knows there are great problems with this 

understanding. It is difficult to find a period of seven years within 

his reign of 43 years when he was absent from his throne or 

inactive as ruler. 

Where, then, during Nebuchadnezzar’s 43 years of rule, can we 

find a period of seven years when he was absent from the throne 

and not involved in royal activities of any kind? The accompanying 

table on the following page lists the years when the Biblical and 

extra-Biblical sources show Nebuchadnezzar still actively ruling on 

his throne. 

As can be seen, the documented activities of Nebuchadnezzar 

appear to exclude an absence from the throne for any period of 

seven years. The longest period for which we have no evidence of 

his activity is from his thirty-seventh to his forty-third and last year, 

a period of about six years. This period ended with his death. It 

should be remembered, however, that Nebuchadnezzar, after his 

“seven times” of madness, was re-established on his throne and 

evidently ruled for some time afterward.―Daniel 4:26, 36. 

So what about the “seven times”? Do they necessarily refer to 

years, as is often held? 

Actually, the word for “times” in the original Aramaic text of 

Daniel (sing. ‘iddan) commonly means “time, period, season” and 

may refer to any fixed and definite period of time. 34 Admittedly, 

the view that at Daniel chapter four, verses 16, 23, 25, 32 it refers 

33 C. T. Russell was at least consistent in claiming that both periods were years, “for 

if three and a half times are 1260 days (years), seven times will be a period just 

twice as long, 2520 years.”— Studies in the Scriptures, Vol. II (originally published 

in 1889), p. 91. 

34 Compare the use of the same word in Daniel 2:8 (”time is what you men are trying 

to gain”), 2:9 (”until the time itself is changed”), 2:21 (”he is changing times and 

seasons”), 3:5,15 (”at the time that you hear the sound”), 7:12 (”there was a 

lengthening in life given to them for a time and a season”), and 7:25 (”they will be 

given into his hands for a time, and times and half a time”).


Documented activity of Nebuchadnezzar’s rule 

Events References N, on the throne Years B.C.E. 

Battle at Carchemish. Invasion Jer. 46:2; Jer. 25:1; Dan. 1:1f., accession-year 605 

of Judah and first deportation BM 21946 accession-year 605/04 

Campaign to Hattu BM 21946 1st year 604/03 

N’s dream of the image Dan. 2:1f. 2nd year 603/02 

Campaigns to Hattu BM 21946 2nd–6th years 603–599/98 

Building activity of N. 

Royal inscription 

7th year 598/97 

(Berger, AOAT 4:1, p. 108)* 

Second deportation. Jehoiachin 2 Ki. 24:11–12; 2 Chron. 36:10; 7th year 597 

brought to Babylon 

Jer. 52:28; BM 21946 

Campaigns to Hattu and Tigris BM 21946 8th–9th years 597–596/95 

Rebellion in N’s army. Revolt 

plans among exiles spread 

to Judah. Jeremiah’s letters 

to exiles. N. marches to Hattu 

BM 21946; Jer. 28:1f.; 

Jer. 29:1–3, 4–30 

10th year 595/94 

Campaign to Hattu BM 21946 11th year 594/93 

Building activity of N. 

Royal inscription 

12th year 593/92 

(Berger, AOAT 4:1, p. 108)* 

Jerusalem besieged for 2.5 years, 2 Ki. 25:1f., Jer. 32:1–2; 52:4–16 15th–18th years 589–87 

desolated. Third deportation 

Ezekiel predicts siege of Tyre Ez. 26:1, 7 18th year 587 

N. besieges Tyre for 13 years Josephus’ Ant. X:xi,1; Ap. 1:21 19th–32nd years 586–573/72 

Ezekiel confirms siege ended Ez. 29:17-18 33rd year 572/71 

N. attacks Egypt as predicted BM 33041 (Jer. 43:10f.; 

37th year 568/67 

Ez. 29:1–16, 19–20) 

N. dies. Evil-merodach’s 

accession-year 

Jer. 52:31–34; 2 Ki. 25:27–30 43rd year 562/61 

*AOAT 4:1 = Alter Orient and Altes Testament, Vol. 4:1 (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1973.)


to years is not restricted to the Watch Tower Society. This 

understanding can be found in ancient sources. 

Thus, the Septuagint (LXX) version of Daniel translated the word 

as “years,” and so does Josephus in Antiquities X:x,6. But the LXX 

text of Daniel was rejected by early Christians in preference of the 

Greek version of Theodotion (usually dated to about 180 C.E.) 

which says “times” (Greek kairoi), not “years” in Daniel chapter 

four. 35 

That some Jews at an early stage interpreted the “times” of 

Daniel chapter four as “years” can also be seen in the so-called 

“Prayer of Nabonidus,” a fragmentary Aramaic document found 

among the Dead Sea scrolls at Qumran, Cave 4, and dating from 

ca. 75–50 B.C.E. This document says that Nabonidus was stricken 

with a “pernicious inflammation ... for seven years” in the Teman 

oasis. 36 

What are the other alternatives? Realizing that the literal 

meaning of the Aramaic word iddan is not “year” but “period” or 

“season,” Hippolytus of the third century says that some viewed a 

“time” as one of the four seasons of the year. Hence “seven 

seasons” would be less than two years. Bishop Theodoret of the 

fifth century, however, noted that people of ancient times, such as 

the Babylonians and Persians, spoke of only two seasons a year, 

summer and winter, the rainless and the rainy seasons. 37 This was 

also the custom among the Hebrews. In the Bible there are no 

references to spring and autumn, only to the summer and winter 

seasons. According to this line of reasoning, the “seven seasons” of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s madness meant three and one-half years. 

35 As a number of citations from Daniel in the New Testament agree with Theodotion’s 

Greek text of Daniel against LXX, Theodotion’s translation is thought to have been 

based on an earlier, pre-Christian textual tradition, which may have been either 

independent of or a revision of LXX.—John J. Collins, Daniel (Minneapolis: 

Fortress Press, 1993), pp. 2–11. See also Peter W. Coxon, “Another look at 

Nebuchadnezzar’s madness,” in A. S. van der Woude, op. cit. (see note 25 above), 

pp. 213–14. 

36 For a recent reconstruction and translation of the text, see Baruch A. Levine and 

Anne Robertson in William W. Hallo (ed.), The Context of Scripture, Vol. I (Leiden: 

Brill, 1997), pp. 285–86. Most scholars suppose that the story about the “seven 

times” of madness originally dealt with Nabonidus and that the “Prayer of 

Nabonidus” reflects an earlier state of the tradition. The book of Daniel, it is held, 

attributes the experience to Nebuchadnezzar because he was better known to the 

Jews. However, there is no evidence in support of this theory, and it is quite as 

likely that the “Prayer of Nabonidus” is a late, distorted version of Daniel’s 

narrative.—Compare the comments by D. J. Wiseman, op. cit. (see note 28 above), 

pp. 103–105. 

37 E, J. Young, op. cit. (see note 23 above), p. 105. Dr. H. Neumann confirms that in 

Mesopotamia there are only two seasons: “a cloudless and dry summer from May 

to October, and a cloudy and rainy winter from November to April.” —Heinz 

Neumann in Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde des Morgenlandes, Vol. 85 (Wien 

1995), p. 242.


Some of the most highly regarded conservative Bible scholars of 

recent times, such as Carl F. Keil and Edward J. Young, either 

reject or feel strong doubts about the theory that the “seven times” 

of Daniel chapter four refer to seven years. The Assyriologist 

Donald J. Wiseman even suggests that the “seven times” should be 

understood as “seven months.” 38 Any of these last-mentioned 

viewpoints would be in acceptable agreement with the information 

we have on the rule of Nebuchadnezzar. 

Some, of course, will point to Revelation chapter twelve, arguing 

that since the 3 1/2 “times” in verse 14 correspond to the 1260 

days (= 3 1/2 years) of verse 6, seven times must mean 2520 days, 

or seven years. 

There is, however, no reason to conclude that the way “times” is 

used in Revelation chapter twelve must automatically apply also in 

other contexts. The fact remains that, since the Aramaic word 

‘iddan simply means “time, period, season,” it could refer to periods 

of different lengths. It does not refer to the same, fixed period 

everywhere it is used. The context must always decide its meaning. 

And even if it could be shown that the “time, and times and half a 

time” at Daniel chapter seven, verse 25, mean three and a half 

years, this still would not prove that the “seven times” or “periods” 

(New American Standard Bible), or “seasons” (Rotherham, Tanakh), at 

Daniel chapter four, verses 16, 23, 25 and 32, mean “seven years.” 

The two chapters deal with two very different events and periods 

and therefore should not be confused. 

In the discussion above it has been shown that the Gentile times 

of Luke 21:24 cannot be proved to be an allusion to the “seven 

times” of Daniel 4. Nor is there any evidence to show that 

Nebuchadnezzar’s “seven times” of madness prefigured another 

period, amounting to 2,520 years of Gentile dominion. Finally, it 

was demonstrated that the “seven times” cannot even be proved to 

mean seven years. These identifications are obviously no more than 

a guesswork without solid foundation in the Bible itself. 

38 Donald J. Wiseman in J. D. Douglas (ed.), New Bible Dictionary, 2nd edition 

(Leicester, England: Intervarsity Press, 1982), p. 821. Dr. Wiseman explains that 

this understanding of ‘iddan at Daniel 4 “arose from my view that a ‘month’ might 

be an appropriate ‘period’ since the nature of Nebuchadrezzar’s illness . . . is 

unlikely to have been a recurrent one.”—Letter Wiseman-Jonsson, dated May 28, 

1987. Compare Wiseman’s discussion of Nebuchadnezzar’s illness in B. Palmer 

(ed.), Medicine and the Bible (Exeter: The Paternoster Press, 1986), pp. 26–27.


C. THE SETTING UP OF CHRIST’S KINGDOM 

As was pointed out in Chapter 1 of this work, Pastor Russell’s 

predictions for 1914 were not fulfilled. When the First World War 

ended, the Gentile nations still ruled the earth instead of Christ’s 

Kingdom, and Jerusalem in Palestine was still occupied by a 

Gentile nation. Evidently, the time for the events expected could 

not be right. But to draw this simple conclusion was not an easy 

thing. Additionally, something had happened: the World War. So it 

was felt that the time was right after all. Russell’s followers, 

therefore, concluded that they had been expecting the “wrong 

thing at the right time.” 39 

C-1: Failed expectations—wrong things at the right time? 

Gradually a new apocalyptic pattern emerged. The World War with 

the many crises following it came to be regarded merely as a 

beginning of the overthrow of the Gentile nations. In 1922 J. F. 

Rutherford, the new president of the Society, explained: 

God granted to the Gentiles a lease of dominion for a term of 

2520 years, which term or lease ended about August, 1914. Then 

came forward the Landlord, the rightful Ruler (Ezekiel 21:27), and 

began ouster proceedings. It is not to be expected that he would suddenly 

wipe everything out of existence, for that is not the way the Lord does 

things; but that he would overrule the contending elements, 

causing these to destroy the present order; and that while this is 

going on he would have his faithful followers give a tremendous 

witness in the world. 40 

This reminds us of later explanations of the 1934 failure by the 

Pastoral Bible Institute editors discussed above. The setting up of 

Christ’s kingdom had earlier been seen as a process which began in 

1878 and which would culminate in 1914 with the destruction of 

the Gentile nations. 41 But in 1922 the starting-point of this process 

was moved forward to 1914 and the overthrow of the Gentile 

nations was expected to take place in the near future. This new 

view was presented by J. F. Rutherford at the Cedar Point 

Convention of September 5–13, 1922 in his address, “The 

Kingdom of Heaven is at Hand”. 

39 A. H. Macmillan, Faith on the March (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 

1957), pp. 48–49. 

40 The Watch Tower, May 1, 1922, p. 139; also published in the booklet The Bible on 

Our Lord’s Return (Brooklyn, N.Y.: International Bible Students Association, 1922), 

pp. 93–94. Emphasis added. 

41 See the article “The Setting Up of Christ’s Kingdom” in The Watch Tower of June 1, 

1922, which still has the 1878 date.


Three years later, in the article “Birth of the Nation” in The Watch 

Tower, March 1, 1925, a new interpretation of Revelation 12:1–6 

was presented in accordance with the new understanding of the 

setting up of Christ’s kingdom, to the effect that the kingdom had 

been “born” in heaven in 1914. That year Jesus Christ “took unto 

himself his great power and began his reign: the nations were 

angry, and the day of God’s wrath began. —Ezekiel 21:27; 

Revelation 11:17, 18.” 42 

C-2: The “downtrodden” city of Jerusalem relocated 

But what about the trampling of Jerusalem by the Gentiles? At the 

end of 1914 the city of Jerusalem was still occupied by a Gentile 

nation, the Turkish Empire. In an attempt to “explain” this 

embarrassing fact, Pastor Russell argued that the persecution of the 

Jews at that time seemed to have practically stopped all around the 

world, and he saw in this a confirmation of his belief that the 

Gentile times had expired. 43 

However, in December, 1917, more than one year after Russell’s 

death, an interesting thing happened. On December 9, 1917, the 

British under General Allenby in alliance with the Arabs captured 

Jerusalem and thus made an end of the nearly seven-centuries-long 

Turkish occupation. This event was looked upon by many 

Christians as a very important sign of the times. 44 

The deliverance of Jerusalem from the Turks in 1917, together 

with the so-called Balfour declaration of November 2, 1917 which 

proclaimed that the British Government supported the 

42 The Bible on Our Lord’s Return (1922), p. 93. 

43 The Watch Tower, November 1, 1914, pp. 329–30; Reprints, p. 55–68. 

44 Christian commentators of several different denominations regarded this event as a 

sign of the times. It will be remembered that as early as 1823, John A. Brown, in 

his The Even-Tide, ended the “seven times” in 1917. In his opinion 1917 would see 

“the full glory of the kingdom of Israel . . . perfected” (Vol. 1, pp. xliii f.) Later in the 

same century the British expositor Dr. Henry Grattan Guinness, too, pointed 

forward to 1917 as a very important date: “There can be no question that those 

who live to see this year 1917 will have reached one of the most important, 

perhaps the most momentous, of these terminal years of crisis”—Light for the Last 

Days, London, 1886, pp. 342–46. 

Aware of these predictions, eight well-known English clergymen, among whom 

were Dr. G. Campbell Morgan and Dr. G. B. Meyer, issued a manifesto which 

among other things declared: “FIRST. That the present crisis points towards the 

close of the times of the Gentiles. . . . FIFTH. That all human schemes of 

reconstruction must be subsidiary to the second coming of our Lord, because all 

nations will be subject to his rule.” The manifesto was published in the London 

magazine Current Opinion of February 1918 and subsequently republished by 

other papers throughout the world. 

Although this manifesto has been cited several times in Watchtower publications 

in support of the 1914 date, it was actually issued in support of the 1917 date and 

resulted from Allenby’s “liberation” of Jerusalem in the latter year.


establishment of a Jewish National Home in Palestine, drastically 

accelerated Jewish immigration to Palestine. Thus, from October, 

1922, to the spring of 1929 the Jewish population of Palestine 

doubled from 83,794 to about 165,000. 

At that time Palestine was still administered by a non-Jewish or 

Gentile nation (England) and the Jews still constituted only a 

minority (about twenty percent) of the population in Palestine. To 

all appearances, Palestine and the city of Jerusalem were still 

controlled by the Gentiles. Yet the Watch Tower Society’s 

president, J. F. Rutherford, in his book Life, published in 1929, 

insisted that the Gentile times spoken of by Jesus at Luke 21:24 

had expired in 1914, arguing that the accelerating Jewish 

immigration to Palestine was the tangible proof of the conclusion 

that this prophecy had been fulfilled. 

But shortly after the publication of Life, this whole idea was 

abandoned; the return of the Jews to the Promised Land was no 

longer seen as a fulfillment of Bible prophecies. Since 1931 such 

prophecies have been applied to spiritual Israel. 45 The logical 

consequence of this change could only be that the end of the 

treading down of Jerusalem was no longer applicable to the literal 

city of Jerusalem: 

The present-day city of Jerusalem over in Palestine is not the 

city of the Great King Jehovah God, even though Christendom 

calls certain places over there “holy”. That city is doomed to 

destruction at the end of this world. But the true Jerusalem will 

live forever as the capital of Jehovah’s universal organization. We 

mean the New Jerusalem, of which Jesus Christ gave a symbolic 

vision to the apostle John on the isle of Patmos. . . . 

Jesus Christ is the “King of kings and Lord of lords” over that 

true Jerusalem. At the close of the Gentile times in 1914 he was 

enthroned as acting Ruler in the “city of the great King”, Jehovah. 

Thus, after an interruption of 2,520 years by Gentile powers, 

Theocratic Government over earth rose again to power in the 

New Jerusalem, never to be trodden down by the Gentiles. 46 

What, exactly, was this “New Jerusalem”? The Watchtower 

book Your Will Be Done On Earth (1958) explains on page 94: 

Back in 607 B.C. the Jerusalem that was overthrown stood for 

the kingdom of God because it had the typical throne of Jehovah 

on which the anointed one of Jehovah sat as his king. Likewise, 

45 The Watch Tower, 1931, pp. 253–54; J. F. Rutherford, Vindication, Vol. II (Brooklyn, 

N.Y.: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 1932), pp. 258, 267–69. 

46 The Watchtower, November 1, 1949, pp. 330–31.


the Jerusalem that is trampled upon by worldly nations stands for 

the kingdom of God. . . . So the end of the trampling down of 

Jerusalem at the complete fulfillment of the “appointed times of 

the nations” would mean the rising again of the symbolic 

Jerusalem, namely, the kingdom of God. 

Thus the end of the trampling down of Jerusalem was 

interpreted to mean the installation of Jesus Christ on Jehovah’s 

throne in the heavenly Jerusalem in 1914. 47 But this relocation of the 

“downtrodden Jerusalem” from earth to heaven created other 

questions, discussed below, which never have been satisfactorily 

answered. 

C-3: Have two “kingdoms of Christ” been set up? 

In the publications of the Watch Tower Society it is constantly 

stressed that Jesus Christ was “enthroned” and his kingdom “set 

up” or “established” in heaven at the end of the Gentile times in 

1914. At that time, it is held, he began to rule “in the midst of his 

enemies” in fulfillment of Psalm 110:1–2. Thereafter, as an initial 

action against these enemies, Jesus Christ is thought to have 

thrown Satan and his demon angels out of heaven and down to the 

earthly realm, in fulfillment of Revelation 12:1–10. 48 

One problem with this scenario is that a number of texts in the 

Bible clearly show that Jesus Christ was enthroned in heaven 

already at the time of his resurrection and exaltation. For example, 

in his revelation to the apostle John, Jesus said: 

To the one that conquers I will grant to sit down with me on 

my throne, even as I conquered and sat down with my Father on his 

throne.—Revelation 3:21, NW. 

That the kingdom of Christ existed already back in the first 

century is also confirmed by the apostle Paul, who in his letter to 

the Christians in Colossae stated: 

He [the Father] delivered us from the authority of the darkness 

and transferred us into the kingdom of the Son of his love, by means of 

whom we have our release by ransom, the forgiveness of our sins. 

—Colossians 1:13–14, NW. 

47 See “Babylon the Great Has Fallen!” God’s Kingdom Rules! (Brooklyn, N.Y.: 

Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 1963), pp. 452–53; “The Nations Shall Know 

that I Am Jehovah”—How? (1971), pp. 232–35; Insight on the Scriptures, Vo1. 1 

(1988), pp. 132–33. 

48 Recent presentations of these views may be found, for example, in the books You 

Can Live Forever in Paradise on Earth (1982), pp. 134–41, and Knowledge That 

Leads to Everlasting Life (1995), pp. 90–97. Both books are published by the 

Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, Inc.


If Jesus Christ was enthroned at his resurrection and exaltation 

and has been reigning in his heavenly kingdom since then, how can 

it be claimed that he was enthroned and his kingdom set up in 

1914? 

In order to resolve this problem the Watch Tower Society has 

been forced to conclude that two kingdoms of Christ have been set 

up: 1) the “Kingdom of the Son of His Love” (Colossians 1:13), 

which was set up at Christ’s resurrection and exaltation, and 2) the 

“Kingdom of Our Lord and of His Christ” (Revelation 11:15), 

which is held to have been set up in 1914. 

Note how the Watch Tower Society, in its Bible dictionary 

Insight on the Scriptures, attempts to tell the difference between these 

two “kingdoms of Christ.” Commenting on Paul’s statement at 

Colossians 1:13–14 quoted above, this dictionary states: 

Christ’s kingdom from Pentecost of 33 CE. onward has been a 

spiritual one ruling over spiritual Israel, Christians who have been 

begotten by God’s spirit to become the spiritual children of God. 

(Joh 3:3, 5, 6) 49 

This first kingdom of Christ, then, is explained to have been a 

limited kingdom, with Jesus Christ ruling only over his congregation 

of followers from Pentecost onward. 

The second kingdom of Christ, on the other hand, is much greater in 

scope and was not set up unti1 1914. In support of this view the 

above-cited dictionary refers to Revelation 11:15, where the apostle 

John heard loud voices in heaven proclaiming that, “The kingdom 

of the world did become the kingdom of our Lord and of his 

Christ, and he will rule as king forever and ever.” (NW) In 

explanation of this vision, the Society’s dictionary states: 

This Kingdom is of greater proportions and bigger dimensions 

than “the kingdom of the Son of his love,” spoken of at Colossians 

1:13. “The kingdom of the Son of his love” began at Pentecost 33 

C.E. and has been over Christ’s anointed disciples; “the kingdom of 

our Lord and of his Christ” is brought forth at the end of “the 

appointed times of the nations” and is over all mankind on earth. 50 

But even on the supposition that Christ’s rule from Pentecost 

onward was limited to his rule over his anointed disciples 

49 Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 2 (1988), p. 169. 

50 Ibid., p. 169. Similarly, on page 136 of the book You Can Live Forever in Paradise 

on Earth (1982), the Watch Tower Society refers to “the kingdom of the Son of 

[God’s) love” mentioned at Colossians 1:13 and states: “But this rule, or ‘kingdom,’ 

over Christians with the hope of heavenly life is not the Kingdom government for 

which Jesus taught his followers to pray.” (Emphasis added.)


(”spiritual Israel”), as the Watch Tower Society holds, the 

consequence of this view is that Christ, as the legal heir to the 

throne of David, since Pentecost onward has been sitting on the 

throne of Jehovah (Revelation 3:21) in heavenly Jerusalem and ruling 

over spiritual Israel, just as David and his son Solomon were said to 

be sitting upon the “throne of Jehovah” in earthly Jerusalem, 

reigning over fleshly Israel. 51 

In view of this first-century restoration of the “kingdom of 

David,” how can it be held that ‘Jerusalem”, understood as being the Kingdom 

of God, went onto be trodden down by the Gentile nations on earth during the 

whole subsequent period, from Pentecost onward right up to 1914? 

The Gentile nations, of course, could not “ascend into heaven” 

(John 3:13) in order to interfere with Christ’s rule during this 

period. Nor can the treading down of “Jerusalem” refer to the 

persecution of “spiritual Israel” (Christ’s followers), as such 

persecution did not stop in 1914. So what did the treading down of 

“Jerusalem” really mean, and how did it stop in 1914? In spite of 

the theory of the two kingdoms of Christ, this question still calls 

for an answer. 

C-4: The universal power of the resurrected Christ 

Does the Bible really support the view that there are two kingdoms 

of Christ entrusted him at two different occasions? Was Christ’s 

“first” kingdom limited to a rule over his anointed disciples from 

Pentecost onward? 

This idea seems clearly to be contradicted by a number of Bible 

passages which emphasize the universal scope of the authority given 

to Jesus Christ at his resurrection and exaltation. Even some time 

before his ascension Jesus stated to his disciples: 

All authority has been given me in heaven and on the earth. — 

Matthew 28:18, NW. 

The past tense, “has been given,” shows that Jesus Christ already 

at that time was in possession of all authority or power in heaven and 

51 The angel Gabriel told Mary that the son she was to bear “will be called the Son of 

the Most High; and the Lord will give him the throne of His father David.” (Luke 

1:32, NASB) That Christ was given “the throne of his father David” at his 

resurrection and exaltation was later confirmed by James, the half brother of 

Jesus, when he at Acts 15:1318 explained to his fellow believers that “the 

tabernacle of David which has fallen” had been erected again, in fulfillment of the 

prophecy of Amos 9:11f. As pointed out by Dr. F. F. Bruce, “James’ application of 

the prophecy finds the fulfillment of its first part (the rebuilding of the tabernacle 

of David) in the resurrection and exaltation of Christ, the Son of David, and the 

reconstitution of His disciples as the new Israel, and the fulfillment of its second 

part in the presence of believing Gentiles as well as believing Jews in the Church.” 

— F. F. Bruce, Commentary an the Book of the Acts (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. 

B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1980 reprint), p. 310.


on the earth. What additional power, then, could possibly have 

remained to be given him in 1914? 

Jesus’ position of power after his resurrection was also 

accentuated by the apostle Paul at Ephesians 1:20–23: 

He [God] raised him up from the dead and seated him at his 

right hand in the heavenly places, far above every government and 

authority and power and lordship and every name named, not only in this 

system of things, but also in that to come. He also subjected all things under 

his feet, and made him head over all things to the congregation, 

which is his body, the fullness of him who fills up all things in all. 

(NW) 

Notice that Paul in this passage declares that Christ’s dominion 

at that time was not limited to a rule over his congregation only, 

but embraced “all things,” “every government and authority and 

lordship and every name named.” Similarly, at Colossians 2:10 Paul 

states that Christ “is the head of all government and authority” 

(NW). And at Revelation 1:5 the apostle John sent greetings to 

“the seven congregations that are in the [district of] Asia” from 

Jesus Christ, “The Ruler of the kings of the earth” (NW). 

Strangely enough, the Watch Tower Society, in the article on 

“Jesus Christ” in its Bible dictionary Insight on the Scriptures, seems to 

contradict its idea of a limited kingdom of Christ from Pentecost 

onward by stating that he since his resurrection “heads a government of 

universal domain.” Notice the following remarkable statements on 

page 61 of Volume 2: 

Following his resurrection, Jesus informed his disciples, “All 

authority has been given me in heaven and on the earth,” thereby 

showing that he heads a government of universal domain. (Mt 28:18) The 

apostle Paul made clear that Jesus’ Father has “left nothing that is 

not subject to him [Jesus] ,” with the evident exception of “the one 

who subjected all things to him,” that is, Jehovah, the Sovereign 

God. (1 Co. 15:27; Heb 1:1–14; 2:8) Jesus Christ’s “name,” 

therefore, is more excellent than that of God’s angels, in that his 

name embraces or stands for the vast executive authority that Jehovah 

has placed in him. (Heb 1:3,4) [Emphasis added.] 

If Jesus Christ already at his resurrection and exaltation was 

given “all authority ... in heaven and on the earth,” and if he since 

then has been “the head of all government and authority” and “the 

Ruler of the kings of the earth” and therefore, from then on, 

“heads a government of universal domain” as even the Watch 

Tower Society admits, how, then, can it be claimed that Christ’s 

kingdom from Pentecost onward was limited to a rule over his


congregation of followers, and that the “kingdom of the world” did 

not become “the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ” until the 

year 1914? 

C-5: Waiting “at the right hand of God” for what? 

On the last day of his earthly life Jesus explained to the members 

of the Sanhedrin, the Jewish high court, that his kingdom rule was 

now due to begin, stating that, ‘from now on the Son of man will be 

sitting at the powerful right hand of God.”—Luke 22:69, NW. 52 

That Christ after his resurrection was elevated to “the right hand 

of God” is repeatedly emphasized by the New Testament writers. 

The phrase “sitting at the powerful right hand of God” is a 

reference to Psalm 110:1, a text quoted or alluded to in the New 

Testament more often than any other passage of the Old 

Testament. 53 This psalm is consistently interpreted by the New 

Testament writers as depicting Christ’s exaltation to the throne of 

God after his resurrection. 54 The first two verses say: 

The utterance of Jehovah to my Lord is: “Sit at my right hand 

until I place your enemies as a stool for your feet.” The rod of 

your strength Jehovah will send out from Zion, [saying:] “Go 

subduing in the midst of your enemies”—Psalm 110:1–2, NW. 

52 The parallel passage at Matthew 26:64 adds another feature to Jesus’ statement: 

“From henceforth you will see the Son of man sitting at the right hand of power 

and coming on the clouds of heaven” (Compare Mark 14:62) The last part of the 

statement is an allusion to Daniel 7:13–14, where Daniel in his vision saw “with 

the clouds of the heavens someone like a son of man happened to be coming; and 

to the Ancient of Days he gained access, and they brought him up close even 

before that One. And to him there were given rulership and dignity and kingdom”. 

It should be noticed that in this vision the “son of man” did not come from heaven 

to earth. Rather, his “coming” is in the opposite direction, to the “Ancient of Days” 

on the heavenly throne, to be given rulership, dignity, and kingdom. This passage, 

therefore, does not seem to be dealing with Christ’s second coming, but rather with 

his enthronement at his resurrection and exaltation. 

53 Professor Martin Hengel finds that Psalm 110:1 is used in twenty-one passages in 

the New Testament, seven of which are direct quotations. The passages are: Matt. 

22:44; 26:64; Mark 12:36; 14:62; 16:19; Luke 20:42f.; 22:69; Acts 2:33; 2:34f.; 

5:31; 7:55f.; Rom. 8:34; 1 Cor. 15:25; Eph. 1:20; Co1.3:1; Heb. 1:3,13; 8:1; 

10:12f.; 12:2; and 1 Pet. 3:22. —M. Hengel, Studies in Early Christology 

(Edinburgh: T&T Clark Ltd, 1995), p. 133. 

54 To sit “at the right hand of God” obviously means to sit with God on his throne, in 

view of Jesus’ statement at Rev. 3:21. This enthronement of Christ is not nullified 

by the fact that the letter to the Hebrews twice presents him as being seated “at 

the right hand of the throne of God.” (Heb. 8:1; 12:2) The language here, of course, 

is figurative. God is not sitting on a literal throne. At Matthew 5:34 Jesus says that 

“heaven . . . is God’s throne.” A “throne” is a symbol of rulership. Whether Christ is 

pictured as being seated on God’s throne or on a separate throne to the right of it, 

the meaning is the same, viz., that he is ruling. Besides, as Professor Hengel 

argues, the sense of the text at Heb. 8:1 and 12:2 is “at the right hand of God on 

his throne,’ rather than “at the right hand of the throne of God.”—M. Hengel, op. 

cit., pp. 142, 148–49. Compare also Revelation 22:1, 3, which speaks of “the throne 

of God and of the Lamb” as one common throne only.


The image of the king as sitting on the throne of his god was also 

used in the Biblical world outside the Bible, as was also the image 

of subjugated enemies being placed as a footstool under his feet. ― 

R. Lepsius, Denkmäler aus Aegypten und Aetiophien (Berlin 1849―58), 

Vol. 5, Bl. 62 and 69a; L. Borchardt, Statuen und Statuetten von 

Königen und Privatleuten (Berlin, 1925), Bl. 93:554; O. Keel, The 

Symbolism of the Biblical World (Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, 1997), 

pp. 255, 263.


To overcome the problem created by the Scriptural evidence for 

Christ’s universal rule “in the midst of his enemies” to have begun 

at the time of his resurrection and exaltation, the Watch Tower 

Society explains that Christ’s sitting “at the right hand of God” 

means, not that he has been ruling from then on, but rather that he 

has been sitting there waiting for his rulership to begin. Support for this 

view is found in the way Psalm 110:1–2 is referred to at Hebrews 

10:12–13: 

When Christ returned to heaven after his resurrection, he did 

not start ruling then as King of God’s government. Rather, there 

was to be a time of waiting, as the apostle Paul explains: “This man 

[Jesus Christ] offered one sacrifice for sins perpetually and sat 

down at the right hand of God, from then on awaiting until his 

enemies should be placed as a stool for his feet.” (Hebrews 10:12, 

13) When the time came for Christ to begin to rule, Jehovah told 

him: “Go subduing [or, conquering] in the midst of your 

enemies.” 55 

This explanation of the word “awaiting” at Hebrews 10:12–13, 

however, creates other problems. In his outline of the reign of 

Christ at 1 Corinthians 15:24–28, the apostle Paul concludes by 

stating that “when all things will have been subjected to him 

[Christ], then the Son himself will also subject himself to the One 

who subjected all things to him, that God may be all things to 

everyone.” This statement gives rise to the following question: 

1. If Christ would have to wait until God had put all enemies 

under his feet before his rulership could begin, and if he then, “when all 

things will have been subjected to him,” would hand over the 

kingdom to God, what becomes of his reign? When the time has come 

for him to start ruling, it is time for him to hand over the kingdom 

to God! 

Another question occasioned by the Watch Tower Society’s 

explanation is this: 

2. If Christ could not start ruling until God had placed all his 

enemies as a stool for his feet, and if Christ’s rule began in 1914, 

how can it be held that all enemies―including “the last enemy, 

death” (1 Corinthians 15:25)―had been put under his feet at that 

time? 

55 You Can Live Forever in Paradise on Earth (1982), pp. 136–37. The more recent 

book Knowledge That Leads to Everlasting Life (Brooklyn, N.Y.: Watchtower Bible 

and Tract Society of New York, Inc., 1995), similarly explains that Christ’s sitting 

at the right hand of God “indicates that Jesus’ rulership would not begin 

immediately after his ascension to heaven. Rather, he would wait” for this rulership 

to begin, that is, until 1914. (Pages 96–97. Emphasis added.)


Strangely, the Watch Tower Society admits that these enemies 

were still active at the time of Christ’s enthronement in 1914, so that 

his rule began “in the midst of his enemies.” In fact, his very first 

action as king is stated to have been an attack on his chief enemies, 

Satan and his angels, whom he is supposed to have thrown out of 

heaven in 1914! 56 

A third question to ask, therefore, is: 

3. If Christ could not start ruling until God had put all his 

enemies under his feet, how can his rule have begun “in the midst of 

his enemies,” and why did he have to start his reign with a war 

against them? 

Obviously, an interpretation that is so patently inconsistent 

cannot be correct. Christ’s “awaiting” at the right hand of God 

cannot have been a waiting for his rulership to begin. Instead, as 

shown by other parallel passages, it has been a waiting for his rule 

“in the midst of his enemies” to end, to reach its conclusive stage. 

Christ’s sitting at the right hand of God cannot have been a 

period of passively waiting for God to put his enemies under his 

feet. To be sure, God is repeatedly pictured as the one who puts 

the enemies under the feet of Christ. But as shown already at Psalm 

110:12, it is Christ himself who takes action against these enemies, 

though in the power given him by God. Jehovah’s inviting him to 

sit down at his right hand is followed by the words: 

The rod of your strength Jehovah will send out from 

Zion,[saying:] ‘Go subduing in the midst of your enemies.’ 

The text clearly indicates that this active ruling in the midst of 

the enemies would begin as soon as Christ had sat down at the 

right hand of God, not after a waiting period of some 1900 years. 

Christ’s “waiting,” therefore, is best explained as his looking forward 

with expectation to the end result of his own active exercise of rule, the final 

and complete victory over his enemies. 57 

This is evidently also how the apostle Paul understood Christ’s 

sitting at the right hand of God, namely, as a period of active 

reigning on his part until he has put all enemies under his feet. In 

his first letter to the Corinthians, Paul explains: 

Then comes the end, when he hands over the kingdom to God 

the Father, after he has destroyed every ruler and every authority and power. 

56 You Can Live Forever in Paradise on Earth (1982), pp. 136–38, 141. 

57 The Greek word for “awaiting” at Hebrews 10:13, ekdechomai, means to “await, 

wait for, expect.”—Colin Brown (ed.), The New International Dictionary of New 

Testament Theology, Vol. 2 (Exeter: The Paternoster Press, 1976), pp. 244–245.


For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. —1 

Corinthians 15:24–25, NRSV. 

Notice that Paul is saying that Christ must reign until―not from the 

time when—the enemies have been put under his feet. According to 

Paul, Christ has been ruling as king ever since his resurrection and 

exaltation. Christ’s enemies, of course, existed also at that time. His 

reign from that time onward, therefore, of necessity has been a 

ruling “in the midst of his enemies.” 

Paul’s statement indicates that the very purpose of Christ’s reign 

is to conquer and subjugate these enemies. When this purpose has 

been accomplished, he is to hand over the kingdom to God. As 

Bible commentator T. C. Edwards aptly remarks in his comment 

on this passage: 

This verse means that Christ reigns until He has put, after long 

protracted warfare, all enemies under His feet. The reign of Christ, 

therefore, is not a millennium of peace, but a perpetual conflict 

ending in a final triumph. 58 

Thus, invested with “all authority in heaven and on the earth,” 

Christ has been ruling, even “subduing in the midst of his enemies,” 

ever since his resurrection and exaltation to the throne of God. 

Who are these “enemies” and in what way has Christ been 

“subduing” them since then? 

C-6: Ruling “in the midst of his enemies” 

At Psalm 110:5–6 the enemies to be subjugated are portrayed as 

earthly kings and nations: 

Jehovah himself at your right hand will certainly break kings to 

pieces on the day of his anger. He will execute judgement among 

the nations; he will cause a fullness of dead bodies. He will 

certainly break to pieces the head one over a populous land. 59 

58 T. C. Edwards, Commentary on the First Corinthians (Minneapolis: Klock and Klock, 

1979; reprint of the 1885 edition), p. 417. 

59 Daniel, too, in explaining Nebuchadnezzar’s dream of the image, pictures the 

enemies of God’s kingdom as earthly kingdoms. The four metals of the image are 

explained to mean four successive kingdoms or empires, starting with 

Nebuchadnezzar’s own kingdom. (Dan. 2:36–43) Then in verse 44 Daniel states 

that God’s kingdom would be set up “in the days of those kings.” Contextually, 

“those kings” can only be a reference to the kings existing at the time of the fourth 

kingdom described in the preceding verses (40–43). This supports the identification 

of the fourth kingdom with Rogme, which held power at the time of the setting up 

of Christ’s kingdom. As Daniel further explains, God’s kingdom would then “crush 

and put an end to all these kingdoms.” As this evidently is a parallel to Christ’s 

“subduing in amidst his enemies” following his enthronement at the right hand of 

God, as described in Psalm 110 and the New Testament, the “crushing” of the 

kingdoms should be understood as a protracted warfare.


In the New Testament, however, the attention is turned from 

the visible enemies to the hostile powers of the spiritual world. 

Undoubtedly, the reason for this is that destruction of earthly kings 

and nations hostile to Christ’s kingdom will not free the universe 

from the real enemies―the spiritual powers, who by means of sin 

and its consequence, death, keep men in slavery. As Paul explains, 

our wrestling is “not against blood and flesh, but against the 

governments, against the authorities, against the world rulers of this darkness, 

against the wicked spirit forces in the heavenly places.”―Ephesians 6:12, 

NW. 

It is these spiritual powers that the New Testament writers, at 1 

Corinthians 15:24–26 and elsewhere, identify as Christ’s primary 

enemies, which he has been combatting and finally will bring “to 

nothing.” 60 

Empowered with “all authority in heaven and on earth” it 

would, of course, have been an easy matter for Christ to instantly 

bring to nothing all these hostile powers. Some Bible passages 

actually present the warfare as already won at Christ’s resurrection 

and exaltation, and the powers as already conquered and subjected. 

(Colossians 2:15; 1 Peter 3:22) Such language, however, is evidently 

used to describe Christ’s all-embracing power and elevated position 

since his resurrection, “far above every government and authority 

and power.” (Ephesians 1:21–22) As the author of the letter to the 

Hebrews clarifies, there is more involved, as “we do not yet see all 

things in subjection to him.”―Hebrews 2:8, NW. 

If Christ’s principal enemies are the hostile spiritual powers, his 

“subduing” in amidst them can hardly mean that he is subjugating 

them in a protracted physical or literal warfare. As explained by the 

apostle Paul, Satan, “the ruler of the authority of the air, the spirit 

that now operates in the sons of disobedience,” is able to hold men 

in slavery only because of their trespasses and sins. (Ephesians 2:1– 

2, NW) Through Christ’s death, however, God provided a “release 

by ransom, the forgiveness of our sins,” by which it was made 

possible for man to be “delivered . . . from the authority of the 

darkness and transferred . . . into the kingdom of the Son of his 

love.”―Colossians 1:13–14, NW. 

Throughout the centuries, millions upon millions of people, by 

their faith in Christ have been delivered from the “authority of 

60 According to Colossians 1:15–16, the spiritual powers were originally created by 

means of Christ. Later a number of them, headed by Satan, “the ruler of the 

authority of the air,” “did not keep their original position” but became enemies of 

God. (Judea, verse 6)—Compare Dr. G. Delling’s discussion of these powers in G. 

Kittel (ed.), Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, Vol. 1 (Grand Rapids: Wm. 

B. Eerdmans Publ. Co., 1964), pp. 482–84.


darkness”. By such conquests “in amidst his enemies” Christ’s 

kingdom has been increasing and truly been proved to be 

victorious. The Bible, therefore, presents Christ’s death for our sins 

as a turning-point for mankind and as a decisive victory over Satan, 

the head of the hostile powers in the spiritual world. (Hebrews 

2:14–15) Though still active, their power and influence since then 

are restricted and curbed. They have not been able to prevent the 

good news about Jesus Christ to reach growing numbers of people 

around the world, making it possible for them to be delivered from 

the “authority of darkness” and brought under the authority of 

Christ. 

C-7: The “casting out” of Satan 

In the metaphorical language of the Bible, someone’s elevation to a 

high position may be spoken of as his being “exalted to heaven” or 

“to the skies,” where he may be likened to a shining star. 61 

Correspondingly, someone’s humiliation, defeat or fall from a high 

position may be likened to a throwing down or falling “from 

heaven.” 62 In his prediction of the fall of the proud and arrogant 

king of Babylon, Isaiah the prophet used this imagery: 

O how you have fallen from heaven, you shining one, son of 

the dawn! . . . As for you, you have said in your heart, “To the 

heavens I shall go up. Above the stars of God I shall lift up my 

throne, and I shall sit down upon the mountain of meeting, in the 

remotest parts of the north. I shall go up above the high places of 

the clouds; I shall make myself resemble the Most High” 

However, down to Sheol you will be brought, to the remotest 

parts of the pit. —Isaiah 14:12–15 , NW. 63 

Jesus, too, used similar language in speaking of the town of 

Capernaum, which he had chosen as his dwelling-place and where 

he had performed many of his miracles. (Matthew 4:13–16) This, 

however, would not become a reason for the town to boast: 

And you, Capernaum, will you perhaps be exalted to heaven? 

Down to Hades you will come! —Luke 10:15, NW. 

61 Similarly, in the English language we may speak of someone being “praised to the 

skies.” 

62 The same metaphors are also found in extra-Biblical sources from ancient times. 

For example, Cicero and Horace (1st century B.C.E.) both likened a fall from a 

great political height to a “fall from heaven.”—See Edward J. Young, The Book of 

Isaiah (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publ. Co., 2nd ed. 1972), p. 440, note 77. 

63 Compare Daniel 8:9–12, which uses the same figurative language in describing the 

presumptuous actions of the “little horn,” usually understood as referring to the 

attempt of the Seleucid king Antiochus IV Epiphanes (175–164 B.C.E.) to root out 

the worship of Jehovah at the temple of the Jews.


Another example of this manner of speech is found in the 

subsequent verses, which tell of the seventy disciples sent out by 

Jesus, who now returned with joy, saying: “Lord, even the demons 

are made subject to us by the use of your name.” Their joyful 

report was evidently owing to their success in expelling demons, 

thanks to the power bestowed upon them by Jesus at his sending 

them out. (Luke 10:1, 19) In answer, Jesus said: “I began to behold 

Satan already fallen like a lightning from heaven”—Luke 10:17–18, 

NW. 

It does not seem likely that Jesus meant he saw Satan literally 

falling from heaven. Rather, his statement vividly expressed the 

excitement he felt at the disciples’ report, as he knew that their 

successful ministry (as well as his own) portended the imminent fall 

of Satan from his position of power. 

That the death, resurrection and exaltation of Jesus Christ would 

mean a decisive defeat for Satan is also indicated by what he said to 

the Jews at his arrival in Jerusalem a few days before his death: 

Now there is a judging of this world; now the ruler of this world 

will be cast out.—John 12:31, NW. 

It is evidently this victory over Satan and his angels that is 

depicted in symbolic scenes at Revelation 12:1–12. In a vision the 

The woman arrayed with the sun, the seven-headed dragon, and 

the child caught away to the throne of God as pictured in The 

Watchtower magazine of May 1, 1981, page 20. According to the 

present Watch Tower teaching, this prophetic scene was fulfilled in 

1914, when Christ’s kingdom (the child) is said to have been 

established (born) in heaven by “God’s heavenly organization” 

(the woman), despite the effort of Satan (the dragon) to prevent 

Christ’s enthronement.


apostle John saw “in heaven” a pregnant woman, “arrayed with the 

sun, and the moon was under her feet, and on her head was a 

crown of twelve stars.” A great seven-headed dragon, later 

identified as “the original serpent, the one called Devil and Satan,” 

was seen standing before the woman ready to devour her child. 

The woman “gave birth to a son, a male, who is to shepherd all the 

nations with an iron rod. And her child was caught away to God and to 

his throne.”—Revelation 12:1–5, NW. 

This cannot possibly picture the setting up of Christ’s kingdom 

in heaven in 1914, as the Watch Tower Society holds. How could 

Christ’s kingdom have been so weak in 1914 that it ran the risk of 

being devoured by Satan and therefore had to be “caught away” 

from his gaping jaws to God’s throne? Such a view is in the most 

pointed contrast to the New Testament teaching that Christ ever 

since his resurrection is in possession of “all authority in heaven 

and on earth” and is exalted “far above every government and 

authority and power and lordship.”—Matthew 28:18; Ephesians 

1:21, NW. 

There was only one time when Jesus Christ apparently was in 

such a vulnerable situation that Satan felt he could “devour” him, 

and that was during his earthly life. It was during this period that 

Satan attempted to thwart the “birth” of Christ as the ruler of the 

world. From the child-murders in Bethlehem to Jesus’ final 

execution under Pontius Pilate, Jesus was his chief target. Satan did 

not succeed, however, as Christ was resurrected and “caught away 

to God and to his throne.” 

As has often been noticed, the presentation of Christ’s 

enthronement as a “birth” at Revelation 12:5 is an allusion to 

Psalm 2:6–9: 

”I, even I, have installed my king upon Zion, my holy 

mountain.” Let me refer to the decree of Jehovah; He has said to 

me: “You are my son; I, today, I have become your father. Ask of 

me, that I may give nations as your inheritance and the end of the 

earth as your own possession. You will break them with an iron 

scepter, as though a potter’s vessel you will dash them to pieces.” 

(NW) 

The New Testament writers repeatedly apply this psalm to 

Christ’s exaltation to the right hand of God. (Acts 13:32–33; 

64 Notice also how the “wrath” of “the kings of the earth” against “Jehovah and 

against his anointed one” at Psalm 2:1–3 is directly applied by the apostle Peter at 

Acts 4:25–28 to the actions taken against Jesus by the Jewish and Roman 

authorities. The same passage is also alluded to at Revelation 11:15–18, which 

first refers to the beginning of Christ’s universal reign in the midst of his wrathful 

enemies and then about God’s “wrath” upon these enemies.


Romans 1:4; Hebrews 1:5; 5:5) 64 This Messianic psalm also, like 

Revelation 12:5, speaks of Christ as been given the power to crush 

the nations “with an iron scepter.” 65 

At Revelation 12:7–12 another scene “in heaven” is presented to 

John, a war scene: “Michael and his angels battled with the dragon, 

and the dragon and its angels battled” with them. The battle ended 

in a complete defeat for Satan and his angels: 

So down the great dragon was hurled, the original serpent, the 

one called Devil and Satan, who is misleading the entire inhabited 

earth; he was hurled down to the earth, and his angels were hurled 

down with him. And I heard a loud voice in heaven say: “Now 

have come to pass the salvation and the power and the kingdom 

of our God and the authority of his Christ, because the accuser of 

our brothers has been hurled down, who accuses them day and 

night before our God.”—Revelation 12:9–10, NW. 

The exclamation following the “casting out” of Satan and his 

angels, that “now has come to pass the salvation and the power 

and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ,” 

clearly points to the time of the death, resurrection and exaltation 

of Christ, who at that time was given all authority in heaven and on 

earth. 

That the “war in heaven” hardly is meant to be taken as a literal 

war is indicated by the subsequent verses. When Satan had been 

hurled down to the earth, he persecuted the heavenly “woman” 

and then “went off to wage war with the remaining ones of her 

seed” who “have the work of bearing witness to Jesus” (Revelation 

12:13–17). Verse 11 states that followers of Christ who became 

martyrs in this war “conquered him [Satan] because of the blood of 

the Lamb and because of the word of their witnessing”. 

This explains the nature of the “war”: Through his death as a 

sacrificial lamb, Christ conquered Satan and brought about his “fall 

from heaven”. Christian martyrs are shown to be partakers in this 

victory, being enabled to conquer Satan “because of the blood of 

the Lamb.” Satan, the “accuser,” is no longer able to accuse them 

“day and night before our God” because, through the death of 

Christ, their sins are forgiven. To all appearances, then, the “war in 

heaven” is a figurative presentation of Christ’s victory over Satan 

through his sacrificial death as a Lamb. Obviously, this “war” has 

nothing to do with the year 1914. 

65 As Christ explained to the congregation in Thyatira, he was already at that time in 

possession of this “iron rod” and could, therefore, promise to share his “authority 

over the nations” with the one “that conquers and observes my deeds down to the 

end,” —Revelation 2:26–27, NW.


As was shown above, the failed prediction that the trampling down 

of Jerusalem would end in 1914 necessitated a reinterpretation of 

this idea. When the year 1914 had passed and the city of Jerusalem 

continued to be controlled by Gentile nations, the Watch Tower 

Society finally changed the location to heavenly Jerusalem, arguing 

that the trampling down ended by the setting up of Christ’s 

kingdom in heaven in 1914. 

This idea, however, was shown to be contradicted by several 

texts in the Bible, which unequivocally establish that Christ’s 

universal kingdom was set up at his resurrection and exaltation, 

when he also began to rule “in the midst of his enemies.” 

Finally, the claim that Satan was hurled down from heaven in 

1914 was examined and found to be biblically untenable. The Bible 

brings it out clearly that the “fall of Satan” was occasioned by 

Christ’s death and resurrection. 

Thus, a number of events that the Watch Tower Society claims 

to have taken place in 1914 are actually shown by the Bible to have 

occurred at Christ’s death, resurrection, and exaltation. 

What, then, about 1914? Does this year have any prophetic 

meaning at all? 

D. 1914 IN PERSPECTIVE 

As discussed in Chapter 1, the upheavals in Europe and other 

parts of the world brought about by the French Revolution and the 

Napoleonic Wars impelled many to believe that the “time of the 

end” had begun in 1798 or thereabouts, and that Christ would 

return before the end of that generation. Numerous schedules for 

the end-time events were worked out, which later on either had to 

be scrapped or revised. 

When, finally, the nineteenth century was gone and the chaotic 

events that inaugurated that century became increasingly remote, 

the prophetic significance attached to the period faded away and 

was soon forgotten by most people. 

The chaotic events of 1914–18, too, now belong to the early 

part of a past century. Is it possible that the interpretations 

attached to the 1914 date will also fade away and finally be 

abandoned and forgottten? There are reasons to believe that this 

date will not so easily be done away with. 

It is not just a question of an erroneous chronology that has to 

be corrected. The unique claims of the Watch Tower movement 

are closely connected with the year 1914.


If the leaders of the Watch Tower organization would admit 

that Christ’s kingdom was not set up in 1914 and that Christ did not 

come invisibly that year, they would also have to admit that Christ 

did not make any specific inspection of the Christian denominations 

at that time and did not appoint the members of the Russellite 

movement “over his domestics” in 1919. Then they would have to 

admit that their claim of being God’s sole “channel” and 

“mouthpiece” on earth is false, and that they for almost a whole 

century have appeared on the world scene in a false role with a false 

message. 

So much of the movement’s identity is invested in the 1914 date 

that it would be an unthinkable step to admit that the sophisticated 

system of prophetic explanations infused into that date is nothing 

but a pipe dream. To openly confess this would amount to 

theological suicide. It’s hardly likely that the present leaders of the 

organization are prepared to undercut their own power base by a 

frank admission of abject human failure. 

Besides, the Watch Tower Society insists that not only its 

chronology, but also the events since 1914 prove that this date marked 

the beginning of the “time of the end.” 66 Referring to Jesus’ 

prophecy at Matthew 24, it is held that wars, famines, pestilences, 

earthquakes, lawlessness, and other calamities since 1914 constitute 

the “sign” of Christ’s “invisible presence” since that year. Although 

it is admitted that earlier generations, too, have had their share of 

such calamities, the Watch Tower Society claims that they have 

been increasing on an unprecedented scale since 1914. Is this true? 

To be able to check if this claim is correct, it is necessary to 

examine the extent of these calamities in earlier centuries, 

something that so far has never been done in the Watchtower 

publications. As most people to a great extent are strangers to the 

past, they are usually easy to convince that the period since 1914 

has been more disastrous than earlier periods. Most people may 

find it difficult to believe that this conclusion is disproved by a careful 

examination of the extent of the calamities in the past. 

An examination of history shows that most of the calamities 

mentioned by Jesus at Matthew 24 have not increased since 1914, 

and that some of them, such as famines and pestilences, even have 

66 On p. 95 of the book Reasoning from the Scriptures (1985) the Watch Tower Society 

summarizes these “two lines of evidence” as follows: “Why do Jehovah’s Witnesses 

say that God’s Kingdom was established in 1914? Two lines of evidence point to 

that year: (1) Bible chronology and (2) the events since 1914 in fulfillment of 

prophecy.”


decreased markedly since that year! The historical evidence of this is 

discussed in the work The Sign of the Last Days—When? 67 

If 1914 did not mark the end of the Gentile times, nor the 

beginning of Christ’s invisible presence, why did the First World 

War break out at a date predicted thirty-nine years in advance? This 

may seem very remarkable. But it must first be remembered that 

none of the things predicted to occur on that date actually 

happened. Secondly, an endless number of dates have been set for 

the second coming of Christ, and also for the end of the Gentile 

times. A predicted date sometimes accidentally happens to coincide 

with some important historical event, although the event itself was 

not predicted. Such a coincidence may be almost unavoidable if 

nearly every year during a certain period have been pointed to in 

advance by various expositors! 

Of the many dates fixed for the expiration of the Gentile times, 

some were put very near to the 1914 date: 1915 (Guinness, 1886), 

1917 (J. A. Brown, 1823), 1918 (Bickersteth, 1850), 1919 

(Habershon, 1844), 1922 (The Prophetic Times, December 1870), and 

1923 (Guinness, 1886). 68 

The Watch Tower Society made many predictions regarding 

1914, but the outbreak of a major war in Europe was not one of 

them. It did not lead to the “universal anarchy” that had been 

predicted. That a major event happened to take place in that year is 

not remarkable. Somewhat more remarkable is when a predicted 

date produces an event that does have some apparent relation to the 

events foretold for the date in question. This, too, has happened. 

For example, 1917 would, according to John Aquila Brown in 

1823, see “the full glory of the kingdom of Israel . . . perfected. ”69 

Although this did not happen in 1917, an important step was taken 

that year toward the establishment of the state of Israel. 70 

67 C. O. Jonsson & W. Herbst, The Sign of the Last Days—When? (Atlanta: 

Commentary Press, 1987). xv+271 pages. Available from Commentary Press, P.O. 

Box 43532, Atlanta, Georgia 30336, USA. 

68 See Table 2 of Chapter 1. 

69 See Chapter 1, note 24. 

70 See note 44 above. Another example is the predictions that pointed forward to 1941 

as the culmination of the “time of trouble.” A number of expositors of the 

prophecies, including John Bacon (in 1799), George Stanley Faber (in 1811), 

Edward D. Griffin (in 1813), Joseph Emerson (in 1818), George Duffield (in 1842), 

and E. B. Elliott (in 1862), ended the 1260 year-days in 1866 and the 1335 yeardays 

in 1941, arguing that the “time of the end” was a period of 75 years (the 

difference between 1335 and 1260). This “time of trouble” would culminate in 1941 

and be followed by the millennium. 1941 was certainly a “time of trouble” as it was 

in this year that the United States joined the war that had started in 1939 and it 

was turned into a world war. The millennium, however, did not follow. — See 

LeRoy Edwin Froom, The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, Vol. III (Washington, D.C.: 

Review and Herald, 1946), pp. 721–22; Vol. IV (1954), pp. 73, 105–06, 174, 262, 

337.


More remarkable still was Robert Fleming’s prediction that the 

French monarchy would fall towards the end of the eighteenth 

century, a prediction made nearly a hundred years prior to that event! 

Fleming’s book The Rise and Fall of Papacy was first published in 

1701. Commenting upon the fourth vial at Revelation 16:8–9, he 

identifies the “sun” as the Papacy, and France as instrumental in 

pouring out the fourth vial. After that, France itself will be 

humbled: 

We may justly suppose that the French monarchy, after it has 

scorched others, will itself consume by doing so—its fire, and that 

which is the fuel that maintains it, wasting insensibly, till it be 

exhausted at last towards the end of this century. 71 

I cannot but hope that some new mortification of the chief 

supporters of Antichrist will then happen; and perhaps the French 

monarchy may begin to be considerably humbled about that time; 

that whereas the present French king takes the sun for his emblem, 

and this for his motto, “Nec pluribus impar,” he may at length, or 

rather his successors, and the monarchy itself (at least before the year 

1794) be forced to acknowledge that, in respect to neighbouring 

potentates, he is even “Singulis impar.” But as to the expiration of 

this vial, I do fear it will not be until the year 1794. 72 

Shortly after the Republic had been proclaimed in 1792, when 

the horrors of the French Revolution were at their most extreme 

and Louis XVI was about to die on the scaffold, Fleming’s 

remarkable “predictions” were recalled to memory. Thus his book 

began to be reprinted both in England and America. The sensation 

his predictions produced was great and caused much excitement; 

and their (partial) fulfillment was a strong incentive to increased 

study of biblical prophecies after the French Revolution. 

Fleming’s calculation of the 1,260 year-days (552–1794) was 

taken over by many others, although the termination date for them 

was soon changed by many from 1794 to 1798, the year when the 

Pope was deposed as ruler of the Papal States and banished by 

French troops. Thus the 1798 date came to be regarded as marking 

the beginning of the “time of the end” by Adventist groups. The 

calculation was later adopted also by C. T. Russell and his followers 

71 Robert Fleming, Jr., The Rise and Fall of Papacy (London, 1849; reprint of the 1701 

edition), p.68. Emphasis added. 

72 1bid., p. 64. Emphasis added.


but changed slightly (in the 1880’s) to the following year, 1799. The 

Seventh-Day Adventists still believe that the “time of the end” 

began in 1798. 

Should not “fulfilled” predictions of this kind help us to take a 

more sober view of the 1914 date? 

In Chapters 3 and 4 of this work much strong evidence was 

presented against the 607 B.C.E. date as the year of the destruction 

of Jerusalem and the starting-point of the 2,520 year Gentile times 

calculation. 

In Chapter 5 it was demonstrated that the seventy-year 

prophecy is in good agreement with the 587 B.C.E. date for the fall 

of Jerusalem to Nebuchadnezzar. Thus, the 2,520 years could not 

have ended in 1914. 

Then, in this chapter, it has been shown that a change of the 

expiration date of those times from 1914 to 1934 resulted in just 

another failed prophecy. Next, the question was raised, “Is the 

2,520-year calculation really founded on a sound biblical basis?” 

The examination that followed demonstrated it is not. Finally, the 

reevaluation of the meaning of the 1914 date in the Watch Tower 

publications since 1922 was examined and found to be deficient. 

For all these reasons, should not the 1914 date be wholly and 

entirely discarded as the pivotal point in the application of Bible 

prophecies to our time? The answer is a resounding “YES!” 

E. SOME NOTES ON THE “GENTILE TIMES” OF LUKE 

21:24 

What, then, about the period called “times of the Gentiles”? If it 

does not refer to a period of 2,520 years , to what period may this 

expression refer? 

The phrase “times of the Gentiles” (”appointed times of the 

nations,” NW) occurs in the lengthy prophecy of Jesus known as 

the Olivet discourse. This discourse is recorded by all the three 

Synoptics (Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21). Only Luke, 

however, uses the expression “times of Gentiles” (kairoí ethnôn). 

The phrase is used in connection with Jesus’ prediction of the 

coming judgment upon Jerusalem and the Jewish nation. Stating 

that there would be “great distress in the land and wrath against 

this people,” Jesus went on to explain how this “wrath” would be 

vented on the people: 

They will fall by the sword and will be taken as prisoners to all 

the nations. Jerusalem will be trampled on by the Gentiles until the 

times of the Gentiles (kairoí ethnôn) are fulfilled. — Luke 21:24, NIV.


Following normal English usage, translators have usually 

employed the definite article when rendering the words kairoí ethnôn 

as, “the times of the Gentiles.” In Greek, the use of the definite 

article would point to a definite and well-known period. Since, 

however, the definite article is not found in the Greek text, the 

phrase “times of Gentiles” can refer to an imprecise period rather 

than one specific period already known to the readers (or listeners). 

The words kairoí ethnôn have been variously interpreted 

throughout the centuries. Bible commentator Dr. Alfred Plummer 

observed: 

The “seasons of the Gentiles” or “opportunities of the Gentiles” 

cannot be interpreted with certainty. Either (1) Seasons for 

executing the Divine judgements; or (2) for lording it over Israel; 

or (3) for existing as Gentiles; or (4) for themselves becoming 

subject to Divine judgements; or (5) Opportunities of turning to 

God; or (6) of possessing the privileges which the Jews had 

forfeited. The first and last are best, and they are not mutually 

exclusive. 73 

A few comments may be necessary to clarify what may be 

implied in each of these alternatives: 

(1) Seasons for executing the divine judgments 

A number of expositors understand the “times of Gentiles” as the 

period allotted to the Gentile armies of Rome for executing the 

divine judgment upon the Jewish nation and its capital. As the 

period required for crushing the Jewish rebellion and recapturing 

Jerusalem lasted for about three and a half years—from the arrival 

of Vespasian’s armies in Galilee in the spring of 67 until the 

desolation of Jerusalem by Titus’ armies in the autumn of 70 

C.E.―these expositors usually also equate the “times of Gentiles” 

with the “42 months” of Revelation 11:2, during which period the 

Gentiles would “trample on the holy city.” 74 

(2) Seasons for lording it over Israel 

In this view the “times of Gentiles” are understood as referring to 

the period of Gentile domination of Jerusalem, dating either from 

70 C.E. or from an earlier point of time. 

73 Alfred Plummer, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Gospel according to S. 

Luke. International Critical Commentary (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1896), p. 483. 

74 Dr. Milton S. Terry, for example, who adopted this view, states: “These ‘times of the 

Gentiles’ are obviously the period allotted to the Gentiles to tread down Jerusalem, 

and those times are fulfilled as soon as the nations shall have accomplished their 

work of treading down the holy city.”—M. S. Terry, Biblical Apocalyptics (Grand 

Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1988. Reprint of the 1898 edition), p. 367.


It is certainly true that Jerusalem, after the destruction of the city 

in the year 70 C.E., was controlled by a successive number of non- 

Jewish nations: Rome (up to 614 C.E.), Persia (up to 628 C.E.), the 

Byzantine Empire (up to 638 C.E.), the Saracen Empire (up to 

1073 C.E.), the Seljuks (up to 1099), the Christian Crusader 

Kingdom (up to 1291 C.E., interrupted by brief periods of 

Egyptian control), Egypt (up to 1517 C.E.), Turkey (up to 1917 

C.E.), Great Britain (up to 1948 C.E.), and Jordan (up to 1967, 

when Israel gained control of the old walled city of Jerusalem). 75 

Many expositors regard this long period of Gentile domination 

as the “times of Gentiles,” or at least as a part of this period, 

arguing that the restoration of the state of Israel marks the end of 

the “times of Gentiles.” For this reason, many of these expositors 

believe that the “times of Gentiles” ended either in 1948 or in 

1967. 76 

(3) Seasons for existing as Gentiles 

According to this view, Jesus was saying that Jerusalem would be 

trampled upon by Gentile nations as long as there are any Gentile 

nations on earth. The “times of Gentiles” are simply regarded as 

referring to the whole period of human history during which there 

have been and will be nations on earth. 

If the Jews can be said to have resumed full control of Jerusalem 

in 1967, it has to be concluded that the Gentile nations have 

continued to exist on earth after the end of the “Gentile times.” 

This, of course, would invalidate the view under discussion. 

However, it may also be argued that, although the Jews have 

been in control of Jerusalem since 1967, the most central part of 

the city, the old temple site, is still in the hands of the Arabs, and 

this site is still occupied by the Muslim “Dome of the Rock” 

edifice. For this reason it may be held that Jerusalem is still being 

“trampled on” or desecrated by “Gentiles.” 

75 A detailed history of the long period of foreign control of Jerusalem is included in 

Karen Armstrong, Jerusalem. One City, Three Faiths (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 

Inc., 1996). 

76 An excellent overview of the applications of Luke 21:24 and other Biblical 

prophecies given by various expositors to Israel’s conquest of Jerusalem in 1967 

and the subsequent events is found in Dwight Wilson, Armageddon Now! (Tyler, 

Texas: Institute for Christian Economics, 1991; reprint of the 1977 edition), pp. 

188–214. An update since 1977 is included in the Foreword on pp. xxv–xlii. A very 

thorough discussion of the various aspects of the significance of Jerusalem in 

Jesus’ prophecy can be found in the book Jesus and the Holy City, by P. W. L. 

Walker (Grand Rapids: Eerdmann’s, 1996).


(4) seasons for the Gentiles becoming subject to divine 

judgments 

Advocates of this view argue that the “times of Gentiles” refer to 

the period for a judgment of the Gentile nations. This period, 

therefore, is still future. As the Roman war against the Jews in the 

period 67–70 C.E. was a time for the judgment of the Jewish 

nation, so there will also be a time for the judgment of the Gentile 

nations. Until these “times of Gentiles” arrive, the Gentiles will 

continue to trample on Jerusalem. 77 

(5) Opportunities of turning to God 

Those holding this view connect the “times of Gentiles” with 

Paul’s statement at Romans 11:25 that “a partial hardening has 

happened to Israel until the fullness of Gentiles has come in” (NASB). 

It is argued that the “times of Gentiles” are related to this “fullness 

of Gentiles” and refer to the times of Gentile mission. This 

understanding evidently implies that the “times of Gentiles” began 

with the conversion of Cornelius. (Acts 10:1–48) These times of 

Gentile mission, as well as the times of trampling on Jerusalem by 

Gentile nations, wil1 continue “until the fullness of Gentiles has 

come in. ”78 

(6) Opportunities of possessing the privileges which the 

Jews had forfeited 

This view is related to the previous one. Due to unfaithfulness 

the Jewish nation was judged and the privileges were taken away 

from the Jews and offered to the Gentiles. (Matthew 21:43) The 

period during which these privileges are made available to the 

Gentiles is regarded as the “times of Gentiles.” 

As may be seen, there are various possible interpretations of the 

phrase “times of Gentiles,” even without the application of the 

“year- day principle” to the period. It must be recognized that the 

phrase itself is stated in Scripture without any specific 

accompanying qualification. To determine which view or views 

give greater evidence of validity would require a detailed and 

77 For a recent exposition of this view, see Dr. John Nolland, Luke 18:35–24:53. Word 

Biblical Commentary 35c (Dallas: Word Books, 1993), pp. 1002–1003. 

78 The note to Luke 21:24 in The NIV Study Bible reflects this view: “The Gentiles 

would have both spiritual opportunities (Mk 13:10; cf. Lk 20:16; Ro 11:25) and 

domination of Jerusalem, but these times will end when God’s purpose for the 

Gentiles has been fulfilled.” Compare also Darrell L. Bock, Luke, Vol. 2 (Grand 

Rapids, Michigan: Baker Books, 1996), pp. 1680–1681.


extensive discussion of each of the various alternatives. Such an 

analysis is beyond the scope of this work, the main purpose of 

which has been to examine the Watch Tower Society’s 

interpretation of the “times of Gentiles” and to demonstrate why 

that interpretation is both historically and Biblically untenable. Any 

further discussion of the factors involved in the meaning of the 

phrase “times of Gentiles,” therefore, will have to be reserved for 

another occasion.

7 

ATTEMPTS TO OVERCOME THE 

EVIDENCE 

A 

S RELATED in the Introduction, the original manuscript of this 

work was first presented to the Watch Tower Society in 1977. 

During the subsequent correspondence with the headquarters of 

that organization, additional lines of evidence were presented 

which were later included in the published edition of the work in 

1983. 

In possession of all this information, it might be expected that 

the Governing Body of Jehovah’s Witnesses at the Brooklyn 

headquarters would have been prepared to reevaluate their Gentile 

times calculation in accord with their stated interest in biblical truth 

and historical facts. On the contrary, they chose to retain and 

defend the 607 B.C.E. date and the interpretations founded upon 

it. 1 

1 Several years before the treatise was sent to the Brooklyn headquarters, some 

members on the writing staff had begun to see the weakness of the prophetic 

interpretations attached to the 1914 date. These included Edward Dunlap, former 

Registrar of Gilead School, and Governing Body member Raymond Franz. These 

researchers, therefore, could agree with the conclusion that the 607 B.C.E. date 

for the destruction of Jerusalem is chronologically insupportable. Some others on 

the writing staff, too, who read the treatise, came to realize that the 607 B.C.E. 

date lacked support in history and began to feel serious doubts about the date. 

(The writing staff at that time included about 18 members.) Even Governing Body 

member Lyman Swingle expressed himself before the other Body members to the 

effect that the Watch Tower organization got their 1914 date (which depends on 

the 607 B.C.E. date) from the Second Adventists “lock, stock and barrel.” However, 

the attempts by Raymond Franz and Lyman Swingle to bring up the evidence for 

discussion on the Governing Body met unfavorable response. The other members 

on the Body did not see fit to discuss the subject, but decided to continue to 

advocate the 1914 date.—See Raymond Franz, Crisis of Conscience (Atlanta: 

Commentary Press, 1983 and later editions), pp. 140–143, 214–216. 

283


A. THE WATCH TOWER SOCIETY’S 

APPENDIX TO “LET YOUR KINGDOM COME” 

The new defense of the 607 B.C.E. date appeared in a book 

published in 1981 entitled “Let Your Kingdom Come”. In chapter 14 

(pages 127–140) of the book another discussion of the Gentile 

times calculation is presented, which does not differ materially 

from previous discussions of the subject in the Watch Tower 

publications. But in a separate “Appendix to Chapter 14” at the 

end of the book, some of the lines of evidence weighing against the 

607 B.C.E. date are now briefly discussed―and rejected. 2 The 

discussion, though, is seriously lacking in objectivity and proves to 

be nothing more than a weak attempt to conceal facts. 

In the area of historical research an event is generally regarded 

as a “historical fact” if it is testified to by at least two independent 

witnesses. We recognize this rule from the Bible: “At the mouth of 

two or three witnesses every matter may be established.” (Matthew 

18:16) In Chapter 2 of the first edition of the present work seven 

historical “witnesses” against the 607 B.C.E. date were presented, 

at least four of which clearly qualify as independent witnesses. 

Most of the records giving this seven-fold testimony are found on 

documents preserved from the Neo-Babylonian era itself. These 

include royal inscriptions, business documents and the Apis stelae 

from the contemporary Egyptian Saite dynasty. Only the 

astronomical diaries, Berossus’ Neo-Babylonian chronology and 

the king list of the Royal Canon (”Ptolemy’s Canon”) are found on 

later documents, but those records, too, were seen to be copied 

from earlier ones that―directly or indirectly―went back to the 

Neo-Babylonian era. 

In Chapters 3 and 4 of the present updated edition of the work, 

the original seven lines of evidence are increased to seventeen. The 

added lines of evidence include prosopographical evidence, 

chronological interlocking joints, and an additional number of 

astronomical texts (three planetary tablets and five lunar eclipse 

texts). The evidence against the 607 B.C.E. date, therefore, is 

overwhelming, and very few reigns in ancient history may be 

(continued on page 289) 

2 ”Let Your Kingdom Come” (New York: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 1981), 

pp. 186–189. The book was written by Governing Body member Lloyd Barry. The 

“Appendix to Chapter 14,” however, was written by someone else, possibly Gene 

Smalley, a member of the writing staff. The “spadework” was probably done by 

John Albu, a scholarly Witness in New York. According to Raymond Franz, Albu 

has specialized in Neo-Babylonian chronology on behalf of the Watch Tower 

Society and did some research in connection with my treatise at the request of the 

Writing Department.

Attempts to Overcome the Evidence 285 

The Watch Tower Society’s “Appendix to Chapter 14” in the book 

“Let your Kingdom Come” (1981), pages 186–189: 

APPENDIX TO CHAPTER 14 

Historians hold that Babylon fell to Cyrus’ army in October 539 

B.C.E. Nabonidus was then king, but his son Belshazzar was co-ruler 

of Babylon. Some scholars have worked out a list of the Neo- 

Babylonian kings and the length of their reigns, from the last year of 

Nabonidus back to Nebuchadnezzar’s father Nabopolassar. 

According to that Neo-Babylonian chronology, Crown-prince 

Nebuchadnezzar defeated the Egyptians at the battle of Carchemish in 

605 B.C.E. (Jeremiah 46:1, 2) After Nabopolassar died 

Nebuchadnezzar returned to Babylon to assume the throne. His first 

regnal year began the following spring (604 B.C.E.). 

The Bible reports that the Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzar 

destroyed Jerusalem in his 18th regnal year (19th when accession 

year is included). (Jeremiah 52:5, 12, 13, 29) Thus if one accepted the 

above Neo-Babylonian chronology, the desolation of Jerusalem would 

have been in the year 587/6 B.C.E. But on what is this secular 

chronology based and how does it compare with the chronology of the 

Bible? 

Some major lines of evidence for this secular chronology are: 

Ptolemy’s Canon: Claudius Ptolemy was a Greek astronomer 

who lived in the second century C.E. His Canon, or list of kings, was 

connected with a work on astronomy that he produced. Most modern 

historians accept Ptolemy’s information about the Neo-Babylonian 

kings and the length of their reigns (though Ptolemy does omit the 

reign of Labashi-Marduk). Evidently Ptolemy based his historical 

information on sources dating from the Seleucid period, which began 

more than 250 years after Cyrus captured Babylon. It thus is not 

surprising that Ptolemy’s figures agree with those of Berossus, a 

Babylonian priest of the Seleucid period. 

Nabonidus Harran Stele (NABON H 1, B): This contemporary 

stele, or pillar with an inscription, was discovered in 1956. It mentions 

the reigns of the Neo-Babylonian kings Nebuchadnezzar, Evil- 

Merodach, Neriglissar. The figures given for these three agree with 

those from Ptolemy’s Canon. 

VAT 4956: This is a cuneiform tablet that provides astronomical 

information datable to 568 B.C.E. It says that the observations were 

from Nebuchadnezzar’s 37th year. This would correspond to the 

chronology that places his 18th regnal year in 587/6 B.C.E. However, 

this tablet is admittedly a copy made in the third century B.C.E. so it is 

possible that its historical information is simply that which was 

accepted in the Seleucid period. 

186


APPENDIX 187 

Business tablets: Thousands of contemporary Neo-Babylonian 

cuneiform tablets have been found that record simple business 

transactions, stating the year of the Babylonian king when the 

transaction occurred. Tablets of this sort have been found for all the 

years of reign for the known Neo-Babylonian kings in the accepted 


From a secular viewpoint, such lines of evidence might seem to 

establish the Neo-Babylonian chronology with Nebuchadnezzar’s 18th 

year (and the destruction of Jerusalem) in 587/6 B.C.E. However, no 

historian can deny the possibility that the present picture of Babylonian 

history might be misleading or in error. It is known, for example, that 

ancient priests and kings sometimes altered records for their own 

purposes. Or, even if the discovered evidence is accurate, it might be 

misinterpreted by modern scholars or be incomplete so that yet 

undiscovered material could drastically alter the chronology of the 

period. 

Evidently realizing such facts, Professor Edward F. Campbell, Jr., 

introduced a chart, which included Neo-Babylonian chronology, with the 

caution: "It goes without saying that these lists are provisional. The more 

one studies the intricacies of the chronological problems in the ancient 

Near East, the less he is inclined to think of any presentation as final. 

For this reason, the term circa ]about] could be used even more liberally 

than it is."—The Bible and the Ancient Near East (1965 ed.), p. 281. 

Christians who believe the Bible have time and again found that its 

words stand the test of much criticism and have been proved accurate 

and reliable. They recognize that as the inspired Word of God it can be 

used as a measuring rod in evaluating secular history and views. (2 

Timothy 3:16, 17) For instance, though the Bible spoke of Belshazzar as 

ruler of Babylon, for centuries scholars were confused about him 

because no secular documents were available as to his existence, 

identity or position. Finally, however, archaeologists discovered secular 

records that confirmed the Bible. Yes, the Bible’s internal harmony and 

the care exercised by its writers, even in matters of chronology, 

recommends it so strongly to the Christian that he places its authority 

above that of the ever-changing opinions of secular historians. 

But how does the Bible help us to determine when Jerusalem was 

destroyed, and how does this compare to secular chronology? 

The prophet Jeremiah predicted that the Babylonians would destroy 

Jerusalem and make the city and land a desolation. (Jeremiah 25:8, 9) 

He added: "And all this land must become a devastated place, an object 

of astonishment, and these nations


188 "LET YOUR KINGDOM COME" 

will have to serve the king of Babylon seventy years." (Jeremiah 25:11) 

The 70 years expired when Cyrus the Great, in his first year, released 

the Jews and they returned to their homeland. (2 Chronicles 36:17-23) 

We believe that the most direct reading of Jeremiah 25:11 and other 

texts is that the 70 years would date from when the Babylonians 

destroyed Jerusalem and left the land of Judah desolate.—Jeremiah 

52:12-15, 24-27; 36:29-31. 

Yet those who rely primarily on secular information for the chronology 

of that period realize that if Jerusalem were destroyed in 587/6 B.C.E. 

certainly it was not 70 years until Babylon was conquered and Cyrus let 

the Jews return to their homeland. In an attempt to harmonize matters, 

they claim that Jeremiah’s prophecy began to be fulfilled in 605 B.C.E. 

Later writers quote Berossus as saying that after the battle of 

Carchemish Nebuchadnezzar extended Babylonian influence into all 

Syria-Palestine and, when returning to Babylon (in his accession year, 

605 B.C.E.), he took Jewish captives into exile. Thus they figure the 70 

years as a period of servitude to Babylon beginning in 605 B.C.E. That 

would mean that the 70-year period would expire in 535 B.C.E. 

But there are a number of major problems with this interpretation: 

Though Berossus claims that Nebuchadnezzar took Jewish captives 

in his accession year, there are no cuneiform documents supporting this. 

More significantly, Jeremiah 52:28-30 carefully reports that 

Nebuchadnezzar took Jews captive in his seventh year, his 18th year 

and his 23rd year, not his accession year. Also, Jewish historian 

Josephus states that in the year of the battle of Carchemish 

Nebuchadnezzar conquered all of Syria-Palestine "excepting Judea," 

thus contradicting Berossus and conflicting with the claim that 70 years 

of Jewish servitude began in Nebuchadnezzar’s accession year.— 

Antiquities of the Jews X, vi, 1. 

Furthermore, Josephus elsewhere describes the destruction of 

Jerusalem by the Babylonians and then says that "all Judea and 

Jerusalem, and the temple, continued to be a desert for seventy years." 

(Antiquities of the Jews X, ix, 7) He pointedly states that "our city was 

desolate during the interval of seventy years, until the days of Cyrus." 

(Against Apion I, 19) This agrees with 2 Chronicles 36:21 and Daniel 9:2 

that the foretold 70 years were 70 years of full desolation for the land. 

Second-century (C.E.) writer Theophilus of Antioch also shows that the 

70 years commenced with the destruction of the temple after Zedekiah 

had reigned 11 years.—See also 2 Kings 24:18-25:21. 

But the Bible itself provides even more telling evidence against the 

claim that the 70 years began in 605 B.C.E. and that Jerusa-


APPENDIX 189 

lem was destroyed in 587/6 B.C.E. As mentioned, if we were to count 

from 605 B.C.E., the 70 years would reach down to 535 B.C.E. However, 

the inspired Bible writer Ezra reported that the 70 years ran until "the first 

year of Cyrus the king of Persia," who issued a decree allowing the Jews 

to return to their homeland. (Ezra 1:1-4; 2 Chronicles 36:21-23) 

Historians accept that Cyrus conquered Babylon in October 539 B.C.E. 

and that Cyrus’ first regnal year began in the spring of 538 B.C.E. If 

Cyrus’ decree came late in his first regnal year, the Jews could easily be 

back in their homeland by the seventh month (Tishri) as Ezra 3:1 says; 

this would be October 537 B.C.E. 

However, there is no reasonable way of stretching Cyrus’ first year 

from 538 down to 535 B.C.E. Some who have tried to explain away the 

problem have in a strained manner claimed that in speaking of "the first 

year of Cyrus" Ezra and Daniel were using some peculiar Jewish 

viewpoint that differed from the official count of Cyrus’ reign. But that 

cannot be sustained, for both a non-Jewish governor and a document 

from the Persian archives agree that the decree occurred in Cyrus’ first 

year, even as the Bible writers carefully and specifically reported.—Ezra 

5:6, 13; 6:1-3; Daniel 1:21; 9:1-3. 

Jehovah’s "good word" is bound up with the foretold 70-year period, 

for God said: 

"This is what Jehovah has said, ‘In accord with the fulfilling of 

seventy years at Babylon I shall turn my attention to you people, 

and I will establish toward you my good word in bringing you back 

to this place.’ " (Jeremiah 29:10) 

Daniel relied on that word, trusting that the 70 years were not a ‘round 

number’ but an exact figure that could be counted on. (Daniel 9:1, 2) And 

that proved to be so. 

Similarly, we are willing to be guided primarily by God’s Word rather 

than by a chronology that is based principally on secular evidence or that 

disagrees with the Scriptures. It seems evident that the easiest and most 

direct understanding of the various Biblical statements is that the 70 

years began with the complete desolation of Judah after Jerusalem was 

destroyed. (Jeremiah 25:8-11; 2 Chronicles 36:20-23; Daniel 9:2) Hence, 

counting back 70 years from when the Jews returned to their homeland 

in 537 B.C.E., we arrive at 607 B.C.E. for the date when Nebuchadnezzar, 

in his 18th regnal year, destroyed Jerusalem, removed Zedekiah 

from the throne and brought to an end the Judean line of kings on a 

throne in earthly Jerusalem.—Ezekiel 21:19-27.


established with such conclusiveness as the reign of 

Nebuchadnezzar II (604–562 B.C.E.). 

A-1: Misrepresentations of historical evidence 

The Watch Tower Society in its “Appendix to Chapter 14” briefly 

mentions some of the lines of evidence against the 607 B.C.E. date, 

including “Ptolemy’s Canon” and the king list of Berossus, but fails 

to mention that both of these king lists are based on sources that 

originated in the Neo-Babylonian period itself. Instead, the Watch 

Tower publication alleges that the origin of their dates is to be 

found in the Seleucid era, that is, some three centuries later. 3 

Further, for the first time the Watch Tower Society mentions 

the Nabonidus Harran Stele (Nabon. H 1, B), a contemporary document 

establishing the length of the whole Neo-Babylonian era up to the 

ninth year of Nabonidus. But it fails to mention another contemporary 

stele from the reign of Nabonidus, the Hillah stele, that also 

establishes the length of the whole Neo-Babylonian era, including 

the reign of Nabonidus! 

Thirdly, the astronomical diary VAT 4956 is mentioned. 

Referring to the fact that it is a copy of an original text from the 

reign of Nebuchadnezzar, claimed to be made during the Seleucid 

era, the Society repeats the theory that “it is possible that its 

historical information is simply that which was accepted in the 

Seleucid period.” 4 This reasoning is completely fallacious, however, 

as it has been proven false by another astronomical diary, B.M. 

32312, a fact the Society passes over in silence, although it is very 

well aware of it. 5 

Finally, the Society mentions the business tablets, admitting that 

these thousands of contemporary documents give the reigns of all the 

Neo-Babylonian kings, and that the lengths of reign given by these 

documents agree with all the other lines of evidence referred to―the 

Royal Canon, Berossus’ chronology, Nabonidus’ royal inscriptions, 

and the astronomical diaries. 6 It fails to mention, though, that such 

agreement refutes the notion that the information on VAT 4956 

could have been concocted during the Seleucid period. Apart from 

the above-mentioned lines of evidence, another strong one against 

3 ”Let Your Kingdom Came” (New York: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 1981), p. 

186. 

4 Ibid., p. 186. 

5 The astronomical diary B.M. 32312 is discussed in Chapter 4, section A-2, of the 

present volume. In the first (1983) edition, the discussion is found on pp. 83–86. 

6 ”Let Your Kingdom Come,” p. 187.


the 607 B.C.E. date is completely ignored, too, namely, the 

synchronisms to the contemporary and independently established Egyptian 

chronology. 

By omitting nearly half of the seven lines of evidence discussed 

in the first edition of the present work (the Hillah stele, the diary 

B.M. 32312, and the contemporary Egyptian documents) and 

misrepresenting some of the others, the real facts about the 

strength and validity of the established Neo-Babylonian chronology 

are concealed. From this basis Watch Tower scholars proceed to a 

critical appraisal of the limited evidence presented. They state: 

However, no historian can deny the possibility that the present 

picture of Babylonian history might be misleading or in error. It is 

known, for example, that ancient priests and kings sometimes 

altered records for their own purposes. 7 

Again, the facts are concealed. Though it is true that ancient 

scribes sometimes distorted history in order to glorify their kings 

and gods, scholars agree that, although such distortion is found in 

Assyrian royal inscriptions and other documents, Neo-Babylonian 

scribes did not distort history in this way. This was also pointed out in 

Chapter 3 (section B-1-b) of the present work, where A. K. 

Grayson, a well-known authority on Babylonian historical records, 

was quoted as saying: 

Unlike the Assyrian scribes the Babylonians neither fail to 

mention Babylonian defeats nor do they attempt to change them 

into victories. 8 

Of the Neo-Babylonian chronicles Grayson says that they 

“contain a reasonably reliable and representative record of 

important events in the period with which they are concerned,” 

and “within the boundaries of their interest, the writers are quite 

objective and impartial.” 9 Of the Babylonian royal inscriptions (such 

as the Nabonidus’ stelae) Grayson remarks that they are “primarily 

records of building activity and on the whole seem to be reliable.” 10 

The scribal distortion of history, then, refers to Assyrian, but 

not to Neo-Babylonian history, a fact which is concealed in the 

Watch Tower Society’s “Appendix” to “Let Your Kingdom Come”. 

7 Ibid., p. 187. 

8 A. K. Grayson, “Assyria and Babylonia,” Orientalia, Vol. 49:2, 1980, p. 171. 

9 Ibid., pp. 170, 171. 

10 Ibid., p. 175.


The next argument advanced by the Society in the “Appendix” 

is that, “even if the discovered evidence is accurate, it might be 

misinterpreted by modern scholars or be incomplete so that yet 

undiscovered material could drastically alter the chronology of the period.” 11 

Evidently the Watch Tower scholars realize that as of now all 

the evidence discovered since the middle of the 19th century 

unanimously points to 587 B.C.E. instead of 607 as the eighteenth 

year of Nebuchadnezzar. Among the tens of thousands of 

discovered documents from the Neo-Babylonian era they have not 

been able to find the slightest support for their 607 B.C.E. 

date―hence, the reference to “yet undiscovered material.” A 

chronology that has to be based on “yet undiscovered material,” 

because it is demolished by the discovered material, is resting on a 

weak foundation indeed. If an idea, refuted by an overwhelming 

mass of discovered evidence, is to be retained because it is hoped that 

“yet undiscovered material” will support it, all ideas, however false, 

could be retained on the same principle. But it should be 

remembered that such a faith is not founded upon “the evident 

demonstration of realities though not beheld” (Hebrews 11:1); it is 

founded solely upon wishful thinking. 

If it really were true that (1) “no historian can deny the 

possibility that the present picture of Babylonian history might be 

misleading or in error,” that (2) “priests and kings sometimes 

altered” the Neo-Babylonian historical records, that (3) “even if the 

discovered evidence is accurate, it might be misinterpreted by 

modern scholars or be incomplete,” and that (4) “yet undiscovered 

material could drastically alter the chronology of the period,” what 

reason do we have for accepting any date from the Neo-Babylonian 

era established by historians―for example 539 B.C.E. as the date 

for the fall of Babylon? This date, too, has been established solely by 

the aid of secular documents of the same type as those which have 

established 587 B.C.E. as the eighteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar. 

And of the two dates, 587 has much better support than 539 

B.C.E.! 12 

If 587 B.C.E. is to be rejected for the above―mentioned 

reasons, the 539 B.C.E. date should also be rejected for the same, if 

not stronger, reasons. Yet the Watch Tower Society not only 

accepts the 539 B.C.E. date as reliable, but even puts so much trust 

11 “Let Your Kingdom Come,” p. 187. 

12 This was thoroughly demonstrated earlier in Chapter 2.


in it that it has made it the very basis of its Bible chronology! 13 If its 

reasons for rejecting the 587 B.C.E. date are valid, they are equally 

valid for the 539 B.C.E. date, too. To reject one date and retain the 

other is not only inconsistent; it is a sad example of scholastic 

dishonesty. 

A-2: Misrepresentation of scholars 

In support of their reasons for rejecting the Neo-Babylonian 

chronology established by historians, a well-known authority on 

ancient Near Eastern history is referred to. 

”Evidently realizing such facts,”―that the present picture of 

Babylonian history might be in error, that ancient priests and kings 

might have altered the ancient Neo-Babylonian records, and that 

yet undiscovered material could drastically alter the chronology of 

the period: 

Professor Edward F. Campbell, Jr., introduced a chart, which 

included Neo-Babylonian chronology, with the caution: “It goes 

without saying that these lists are provisional. The more one 

studies the intricacies of the chronological problems in the ancient 

Near East, the less he is inclined to think of any presentation as 

final. For this reason, the term circa [about] could be used even 

more liberally than it is.” 14 

This quotation is taken from a chapter written by Edward F. 

Campbell, Jr., which first appeared in The Bible and the Ancient Near 

East (BANE), a work edited by G. Ernest Wright and published by 

Routledge and Kegan Paul of London, in 1961. The Watch Tower 

Society did not mention, however, that the chart referred to in this 

work covers the chronologies of Egypt, Palestine, Syria, Asia 

Minor, Assyria and Babylon from c. 3800 B.C.E. to the death of 

Alexander the Great in 323 B.C.E., and although the term circa is 

placed before many of the reigns given in the lists for this long 

period, no circas are placed before any of the reigns given for the kings of the 

Neo-Babylonian period! 

13 As was pointed out above in Chapter 2, from 1955 up to about 1971 the date 539 

was termed an “absolute date” in Watch Tower publications. When it was 

discovered that this date did not have the support that Watch Tower scholars 

imagined, they dropped this term. In Aid to Bible Understanding, page 333 (= 

Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 1, p.459), 539 is called “a pivotal point.” And in ‘Let 

Your Kingdom Come” it is stated only that “historians calculate,” “hold,” or “accept” 

that Babylon fell in October 539 B.C.E. (pp. 136, 186, 189). Yet the Society still 

anchors its whole “Bible chronology” to this date. 

14 “Let Your Kingdom Come,” p. 187.


The question is: When Professor Campbell, in cooperation with 

Professor David N. Freedman, prepared the chronological lists in 

The Bible and the Ancient Near East, did he then feel that “the present 

picture of Babylonian history might be misleading or in error” 

when it comes to the Neo-Babylonian era? Did he think there was 

any possibility that “ancient priests and kings sometimes altered” 

the Neo-Babylonian records “for their own purposes”? Was he, for 

whatever reason, prepared to put the term circa before any of the 

reigns of the Neo-Babylonian kings? In other words, did the Watch 

Tower Society give a correct presentation of the views of Campbell 

and Freedman? 

When these questions were put to Dr. Campbell, he wrote in 

reply: 

As perhaps you will have concluded, I am dismayed at the use 

made of Noel Freedman’s and my chronological lists by the Watch 

Tower Society. I fear that some earnest folk will reach for any 

straw to support their already-arrived-at conclusions. This is most 

certainly a case of doing just that. 

Let me first explain that the division of responsibility for the 

chronological charts in BANE assigned the larger Near Eastern 

chronology to me and the Biblical dates to Professor David Noel 

Freedman, now of the University of Michigan. We did indeed talk 

about the caveats we placed before our charts, but there was 

absolutely no intent to suggest that there was leeway of as much as 

twenty years for the dates relating [to] Babylonia and Judah. I am 

fairly confident that Dr. Freedman makes explicit somewhere in 

the apparatus of the BANE chapter that the 587/6 date can be off 

by no more than one year, while the 597 date is one of the very 

few secure dates in our whole chronological repertoire. I know that 

he remains convinced of this, as do I. There is not a shred of 

evidence that I know of to suggest even the possibility that the 

dates in The Babylonian Chronicle have been altered by priests or 

kings for pious reasons. I am in hearty agreement with Grayson! 15 

15 Letter received from Dr. Edward F. Campbell, Jr., dated August 9, 1981. The 

reason for uncertainty among scholars as to whether Jerusalem was desolated in 

587 or 586 B.C.E. stems from the Bible, not extra-biblical sources. All scholars 

agree in dating Nebuchadnezzar’s eighteenth regnal year to 587/86 B.C.E. (Nisan 

to Nisan). The Bible dates the desolation to Nebuchadnezzar’s nineteenth regnal 

year at 2 Kings 25:8 and Jeremiah 52:12 (the latter passage being an almost literal 

repetition of the former), but to his eighteenth year at Jeremiah 52:29. This 

discrepancy may be solved if a nonaccession year system is postulated for the 

kings of Judah. (See the section, “Methods of reckoning regnal years,” in the 

Appendix for Chapter 2 below). The 597 B.C.E. date for the earlier capture of 

Jerusalem and the deportation of Jehoiachin, says Dr. Campbell, is one of the very 

few secure historical dates recognized by scholars. The reason is the exact 

synchronism between the Bible and the Babylonian Chronicle at this point.—See 

the two sections, “The ‘third year of Jehoiakim’ (Daniel 1:1–2)” and “Chronological 

tables covering the seventy years,” in the Appendix for Chapter 5 that follows.


Dr. Campbell forwarded the questions put to him to Dr. 

Freedman, to give the latter an opportunity to express his views. 

Freedman had the following to say on the matter: 

. . . I agree entirely with everything that Dr. Campbell has 

written to you. It is true that there are some uncertainties about 

biblical chronology for this period, but those uncertainties stem 

from confusing and perhaps conflicting data in the Bible, and have 

nothing to do with the chronological information and evidence for 

the Neo-Babylonian period from cuneiform inscriptions and other 

non-biblical sources. This is one of the best-known periods of the 

ancient world, and we can be very sure that the dates are correct to 

within a year or so, and many of the dates are accurate to the day 

and month. There is therefore absolutely no warrant for the 

comments or judgments made by the Watchtower Society based 

on a statement about our uncertainty. What I had specifically in 

mind was the disagreement among scholars as to whether the fall 

of Jerusalem should be dated in 587 or 586. Eminent scholars 

disagree on this point, and unfortunately we do not have the 

Babylonian chronicle for this episode as we do for the capture of 

Jerusalem in 597 (that date is now fixed exactly). But it is only a 

debate about one year at most (587 or 586), so it would have no 

bearing upon the views of the Jehovah’s Witnesses who apparently 

want to rewrite the whole history of the time and change the dates 

rather dramatically. There is no warrant whatever for that. 16 

Thus the Watch Tower Society, in its attempt to find support 

for the 607 B.C.E. date, misrepresented the views of Dr. Campbell 

and Dr. Freedman. Neither of them believes that ancient priests or 

kings might have “altered records” from the Neo-Babylonian 

period, or that “yet undiscovered material could drastically alter the 

chronology of the period.” And neither of them is prepared to put 

the term circa before any of the reigns given in their lists for the 

kings of the Neo-Babylonian era. 

The only uncertainty they point to is whether the date for the 

desolation of Jerusalem should be set at 587 or 586 B.C.E., and this 

uncertainty does not come from any errors or obscurities in the 

extra-biblical sources, but from the seemingly conflicting figures 

given in the Bible, evidently its references to Jerusalem’s 

destruction as taking place, in one case, in Nebuchadnezzar’s 

eighteenth year, and, in another, in his nineteenth year.―Jeremiah 

52:28, 29; 2 Kings 25:8. 

16 Letter received from Dr. David N. Freedman, dated August 16, 1981.


A-3: Misrepresentation of ancient writers 

The last two pages of the “Appendix” to “Let Your Kingdom Come” 

are devoted to a discussion of Jeremiah’s prophecy of the seventy 

years. 17 All arguments in this section have been thoroughly refuted 

in Chapter 5 of the present work, “The Seventy Years for Babylon” 

(which corresponds to chapter 3 of the first edition), to which the 

reader is directed. Only a few points will be made here. 

Against Berossus’ statement that Nebuchadnezzar took Jewish 

captives in his accession year, shortly after the battle at Carchemish 

(see Chapter 5 above, section A-4), it is argued that “there are no 

cuneiform documents supporting this .” 18 But the Watch Tower 

Society fails to mention that Berossus’ statement is clearly supported by the 

most direct reading of Daniel 1:1–6. 19 

Daniel reports that “in the third year of the kingship of 

Jehoiakim” (corresponding to the accession year of 

Nebuchadnezzar; see Jeremiah 25:1) Nebuchadnezzar took a 

tribute from Judah, consisting of utensils from the temple and also 

“some of the sons of Israel and of the royal offspring and of the 

nobles,” and brought them to Babylonia. (Daniel 1:1–3, NW) It is 

true that the Babylonian Chronicle does not specifically mention 

these Jewish captives. It does mention, however, that 

Nebuchadnezzar, in his accession year, “marched about 

victoriously in Hattu,” and that “he took the vast booty of Hattu to 

Babylon.” 20 Most probably captives from the Hattu territory were 

included in this “vast booty,” as is also pointed out by Professor 

Gerhard Larsson: 

It is certain that this “heavy tribute” consisted not only of 

treasure but also of prisoners from the conquered countries. To refrain from 

doing so would have been altogether too alien from the customs 

of the kings of Babylon and Assyria. 21 

Thus, although the Babylonian Chronicle does not specifically 

mention the (probably very small) Jewish deportation in the 

17 “Let Your Kingdom Come,” pp. 188, 189. 

18 Ibid., p. 188. 

19 See the section, “The ‘third year of Jehoiakim’ (Daniel 1:1–2)” in the Appendix for 

Chapter 5 below. 

20 A. K. Grayson, Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles (Locust Valley, New York: J. J. 

Augustin Publisher, 1975), p. 100. 

21 Gerhard Larsson, “When did the Babylonian Captivity Begin?,” Journal of 

Theological Studies, Vol. 18 (1967), p. 420.


accession year of Nebuchadnezzar, it strongly indicates this to have 

taken place, in agreement with the direct statements of Daniel and 

Berossus. 

Further, it is to be noticed that the same Babylonian chronicle 

(BM 21946) speaks of the vast booty taken to Babylon in the seventh 

year of Nebuchadnezzar in similar laconic terms. Although it is 

known from the Bible (2 Kings 24:10–17; Jeremiah 52:28) that this 

booty included thousands of Jewish captives, the chronicle does not 

mention anything about this but just says: 

A king of his own choice he [Nebuchadnezzar] appointed in the 

city (and) taking the vast tribute he brought it into Babylon. 22 

If, therefore, the silence of the cuneiform documents about the 

deportation of Jewish captives in the accession year of 

Nebuchadnezzar indicates, as the “Appendix” of “Let Your Kingdom 

Come” implies, that it did not take place, the silence about the 

deportation in his seventh year would indicate that this one did not 

take place either. However, since the Bible mentions both 

deportations, the Babylonian chronicle evidently includes them in 

the “vast booty” or tribute taken to Babylon at both occasions. 

The Society finds another argument against a deportation in the 

accession year of Nebuchadnezzar in Jeremiah 52:28–30: 

More significantly, Jeremiah 52:28–30 carefully reports that 

Nebuchadnezzar took Jews captive in his seventh year, in his 18th 

year and his 23rd year, not his accession year. 23 

This argument, however, presupposes that Jeremiah 52:28–30 

contains a complete record of the deportations, which it clearly does 

not. The sum total of Jewish captives taken in the three 

deportations referred to in the passage is given in verse 30 as “four 

thousand and six hundred.” However, 2 Kings 24:14 gives the 

number of those deported during only one of these deportations as “ten 

thousand” (and perhaps 8,000 more in verse 16, if these are not 

included in the first number)! 

Different theories have been proposed to explain this 

discrepancy, none of which may be regarded as more than a guess. 

22 A. K. Grayson, op. cit., p. 102. (Emphasis added.) 

23 “Let Your Kingdom Come,” p. 188.


The Watch Tower Society’s Bible dictionary Insight on the Scriptures, 

for instance, states that the figures at Jeremiah 52:28–30 

“apparently refers to those of a certain rank, or to those who were 

family heads.” 24 The New Bible Dictionary holds that “the difference 

in figures is doubtless due to different categories of captives being 

envisaged.” 25 All agree that Jeremiah 52:28–30 does not give a 

complete number of those deported, and some commentators also 

suggest that not all deportations are mentioned in the text. 26 

At least the deportation in the accession year of 

Nebuchadnezzar described by Daniel is not mentioned by 

Jeremiah―which does not prove that it did not take place. The 

reason why it is not included among the deportations enumerated 

in Jeremiah 52:28–30 most probably is that it was a small 

deportation only, consisting of Jews chosen from among “the royal 

offspring and of the nobles” with the intention of using them as 

servants at the royal palace. (Daniel 1:3–4) The important thing is 

that Daniel, independently of Berossus, mentions this deportation in the 

accession year of Nebuchadnezzar. 

Against the clear statements of both Daniel and Berossus, the 

Watch Tower Society refers to the Jewish historian Josephus, who 

claims that, in the year of the battle of Carchemish (during 

Nebuchadnezzar’s accession year), Nebuchadnezzar conquered all 

of Syria-Palestine “excepting Judea.” 27 The Watch Tower 

publication argues that this conflicts with the claim that the 70-year 

servitude began in that accession year Josephus wrote this more 

than 600 years after Daniel and almost 400 years after Berossus. 

Even if he were right, this would not contradict the conclusion that 

the servitude of the nations surrounding Judah began in the 

accession year of Nebuchadnezzar. Jeremiah’s prophecy clearly 

applies the servitude, not to the Jews, but to “these nations” 

(Jeremiah 25:11), that is, the nations surrounding Judah. (See 

Chapter 5 above, section A-1.) In fact, Josephus even supports the 

conclusion that these nations became subservient to 

Nebuchadnezzar in his accession year, as he states that the king of 

24 Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 1 (1988), p. 415. 

25 New Bible Dictionary, 2nd edition, ed. by J. D. Douglas et al (Leicester, England: 

Inter-Varsity Press, 1982), p. 630. 

26 See Albertus Pieters’ discussion in From the Pyramids to Paul (New York: Thomas 

Nelson and Sons, 1935), pp. 184–189. 

27 “Let Your Kingdom Come,” p. 188, quoting from Josephus’ Antiquities of the Jews X, 

vi,1.


Babylon at that time “took all Syria, as far as Pelusium, excepting 

Judea.” Pelusium lay on the border of Egypt. 

There is no reason, however, to believe that Josephus’ statement 

is more trustworthy than the information given by Daniel and 

Berossus. Josephus here evidently presented a conclusion of his 

own, based on a misunderstanding of 2 Kings 24:1. Dr. E. W. 

Hengstenberg, in his thorough discussion of Daniel 1:1ff., gives the 

following comment on the expression “excepting Judea” in 

Josephus’ Antiquities X, vi, 1: 

It should not be thought that Josephus got the parex tes Ioudaias 

[excepting Judea] from a source no longer available to us. What 

follows shows clearly that he just derived it from a 

misunderstanding of the passage at 2 Kings 24:1. As he 

erroneously understood the three years mentioned there as the 

interval between the two invasions, he thought that no invasion 

could be presumed before the 8th year of Jehoiakim. 28 

Josephus’ statement thus carries little weight against the 

testimony of Berossus, who evidently, unlike Josephus, got his 

information from sources preserved from the Neo-Babylonian 

period itself, and the testimony of Daniel, as one personally 

involved in the deportation he himself describes. 

The Watch Tower Society next quotes two passages from 

Josephus’ works in which the seventy years are described as 

seventy years of desolation (Antiquities X, ix, 7, and Against Apion, I, 

19). 29 But they conceal the fact that Josephus, in his last reference 

to the period of Jerusalem’s desolation, states that the desolation lasted 

for fifty years, not seventy! The statement is found in Against Apion I, 

21, where Josephus quotes Berossus’ statement on the Neo- 

Babylonian reigns, and says: 

This statement is both correct and in accordance with our 

books [that is, the Holy Scriptures]. For in the latter it is recorded 

that Nabochodonosor in the eighteenth year of his reign 

devastated our temple, that for fifty years it ceased to exist, that in the 

28 Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg, Die Authentie des Daniels und die Integrität des 

Sacharjah (Berlin, 1831), p. 57. Translated from the German. 

29 Josephus mentions the seventy years five times in his works, viz., at Antiquities X, 

7, 3; X, 9, 7; XI, 1, 1; XX, 10, 2; and Against Apion I, 19. In these passages the 

seventy years are alternatingly referred to as a period of slavery, captivity, or 

desolation, extending from the destruction of Jerusalem until the first year of 

Cyrus.


second year of Cyrus the foundations were laid, and lastly that in 

the second year of the reign of Darius it was completed. 30 

In support of this statement Josephus quotes, not only the 

figures of Berossus, but also the records of the Phoenicians, which 

give the same length for this period. Thus in this passage Josephus 

contradicts and refutes his earlier statements on the length of the 

period of desolation. Is it really honest to quote Josephus in 

support of the idea that the desolation lasted for seventy years, but 

conceal the fact that he in his latest statement on the length of the 

period argues that it lasted for fifty years? It is quite possible, even 

probable, that in this last passage he corrected his earlier statements 

about the length of the period. 

The translator of Josephus, William Whiston, wrote a special 

dissertation on Josephus’ chronology, entitled “Upon the 

Chronology of Josephus,” which he included in his publication of 

30 Josephus’ Against Apion I, 21 is here quoted from the translation of H. St. J. 

Thackeray, published in the Loeb Classical Library (Cambridge, Massachusetts, 

and London, England: Harvard University Press, 1993 reprint of the 1926 edition), 

pp. 224–225. Some defenders of the watch Tower Society’s chronology claim that 

there is a textual problem with the “fifty years,” pointing out that some 

manuscripts have “seven years” instead of “fifty” at I, 21, which some earlier 

scholars felt could be a corruption for “seventy” Modern textual critics, however, 

have demonstrated that this conclusion is wrong. It has been shown that all extant 

Greek manuscripts of Against Apion are later copies of a Greek manuscript from 

the twelfth century CE., Laurentianus 69, 22. That the figure “seven” in these 

manuscripts is corrupt is agreed upon by all modern scholars. Further, it is 

universally held by all modem textual critics that the best and most reliable 

witnesses to the original text of Against Apion are found in the quotations by the 

church fathers, especially by Eusebius, who quotes extensively and usually 

literally and faithfully from Josephus’ works. Against Apion I, 21 is quoted in two 

of Eusebius’ works: (1) in his Preparation for the Gospel, I, 550, 18–22, and (2) in 

his Chronicle (preserved only in an Armenian version), 24, 29–25, 5. Both of these 

works have “50 years” at I, 21. The most important of the two works is the first, of 

which a number of manuscripts have been preserved from the tenth century C.E. 

onwards. 

All modern critical editions of the Greek text of Against Apion have “fifty” (Greek, 

pentêkonta) at Against Apion 1, 21, including those of B. Niese (1889), S. A. Naber 

(1896), H. St. J. Thackeray (1926), and T. Reinach & L. Blum (1930). Niese’ s 

critical edition of the Greek text of Against Apion is still regarded as the standard 

edition, and all later editions are based on—and improvements of—his text. A new 

critical textual edition of all the works of Josephus is presently being prepared by 

Dr. Heintz Schreckenberg, but it will probably take many years still before it is 

ready for publication. 

Finally, it should be observed that Josephus’ statement about the “fifty years” at 

Against Apion I, 21 is preceded by his presentation of Berossus’ figures for the 

reigns of the Neo-Babylonian kings, and these figures show there was a period of 

fifty years, not seventy, from the 18th year of Nebuchadnezzar to the second year 

of Cyrus. Josephus himself emphasizes that Berossus’ figures are “both correct 

and in accordance with our books.” Thus the context, too, requires the “fifty years” 

at Against Apion I, 21.


Josephus’ complete works as Appendix V. 31 In this careful study 

Whiston points out that often in the later parts of his works, 

Josephus attempted to correct his earlier figures. Thus he 

demonstrates that Josephus first gives the length of the period 

from the Exodus to the building of the temple as 592 years, which 

figure he later changed to 612. 32 The next period, from the building 

of the temple to its destruction, he first gives as 466 years, which 

he later “corrected” to 470. 33 

Of the seventy years, which Josephus first reckons from the 

destruction of the temple to the return of the Jewish exiles in the 

first year of Cyrus, Whiston says that “it is certainly Josephus’ own 

calculation,” and that the 50 years for this period given in Against 

Apion I, 21, “may probably be his own correction in his old age.” 34 

If this is the case, Josephus might even be quoted as an 

argument against the application of the seventy years made by the 

Watch Tower Society. In any case, it seems obvious that his 

statements on the seventy years cannot be used as an argument 

against Berossus in the way the Society does. Josephus’ last figure 

for the length of the desolation period is in complete agreement with 

Berossus’ chronology, and Josephus even emphasizes this agreement! 35 

In addition to Josephus, the Watch Tower Society also refers to 

Theophilus of Antioch, who wrote a defense of Christianity towards 

the end of the second century C.E. As the Society points out, he 

commenced the seventy years with the destruction of the temple. 36 

But the Watch Tower writers conceal the fact that Theophilus was 

confused about the end of the period , as he first places this in the 

“second year” of Cyrus (537/36 B.C.E.) and then in the “second 

year . . . of Darius” (520/19 B.C.E.). 37 

Some other early writers, including Theophilus’ contemporary, 

Clement of Alexandria (c. 150–215 C.E.), also ended the seventy 

31 Josephus’ Complete Works, translated by William Whiston (Grand Rapids: Kregel 

Publications, 1978), pp. 678–708. Whiston’s translation was originally published 

in 1737. 

32 1bid., p. 684, § 14. 

33 Ibid., p. 686, § 19. 

34 Ibid., pp. 688, 689, § 23. 

35 Against Apion I, 20–21. 

36 “Let Your Kingdom Come,” p.188. 

37 On Theophilus’ application of the seventy years, see A. Roberts and J. Donaldson, 

eds., The Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 2 (Grand Rapids: Wm. Eerdmans Publishing 

Co., reprinted 1979), p. 119. Theophilus probably based his terminal date of the 

seventy years on Ezra 4:24, confusing Darius Hystaspes with “Darius the Mede” of 

Daniel 5:31 and 9:1–2.


years “in the second year of Darius Hystaspes” (520/19 B.C.E.), 

which would place the desolation of Jerusalem about 590/89 

B.C.E. 38 

Eusebius in his chronicle (published c. 303 C.E.) adopted 

Clement’s view, but also tries another application, starting with the 

year in which Jeremiah began his activity, forty years prior to the 

desolation of Jerusalem, and he ends the seventy years in the first 

year of Cyrus, which he sets at c. 560 B.C.E. Julius Africanus, in c. 

221 C.E., applies the seventy years to the period of Jerusalem’s 

desolation, the end of which he, like Eusebius later, erroneously 

dates to c. 560 B.C.E. It is very obvious that these early Christian 

writers did not have access to sources that could have helped them 

to establish an exact chronology for this ancient period. 

The Watch Tower Society’s use of ancient writers then, is 

demonstrably very selective. They quote Josephus on the seventy 

years of desolation, at the same time concealing the fact that he 

finally gives fifty years for the period. Their reference to 

Theophilus reflects the same methods: He is quoted, not because 

he really presents evidence that supports them, but because his 

calculation to some extent agrees with theirs. Other contemporary 

Christian writers, whose calculations differ from theirs, are ignored. 

This procedure is a clear misrepresentation of the full body of 

evidence from the various ancient writers who discussed the matter 

at hand. 

A-4: Misrepresentation of the Biblical evidence 

In its further discussion of the seventy years , the Watch Tower 

Society attempts to show that, even if the historical evidence is 

against their application of the period, the Bible is on their side. 

First, at the top of page 188 of ‘Let Your Kingdom Come,” they state, 

categorically, that “we believe that the most direct reading of 

Jeremiah 25:11 and other texts is that the 70 years would date from 

when the Babylonians destroyed Jerusalem and left the land of 

Judah desolate.” 

The simple truth is, however, that the Society bluntly refuses to 

accept the most natural understanding of Jeremiah 25:11 and a 

38 Ibid., p. 329. This application of the seventy years may have been influenced by 

Rabbinic views. Referring to the Rabbinic chronicle Seder Olam Rabbah (SOR), Dr. 

Jeremy Hughes points out that “later Jewish tradition reckoned 52 years for the 

Babylonian exile (SOR 27) and 70 years as the interval between the destruction of 

the first temple and the foundation of the second temple, with this event dated in 

the second year of Darius (SOR 28; cf. Zc 1.12).” The 70 year-period was “divided 

into 52 years of exile and 18 years from the return to the foundation of the second 

temple (SOR 29).”—Jeremy Hughes, Secrets of the Times (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 

1990), pp. 41 and 257.


number of other texts related to this subject. 39 As was discussed in 

Chapter 5, the most direct reading of Jeremiah 25:11 shows the 

seventy years to be a period of servitude, not desolation: “These nations 

shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years.” (NASB) It was 

further pointed out that the other text in Jeremiah referring to the 

seventy years, Jeremiah 29:10, confirms this understanding. The 

most direct reading of the best and most literal translation of this 

text shows those “seventy years” to be a reference to the 

Babylonian rule: “When seventy years have been completed for 

Babylon.” (NASB) Both texts clearly refer to Babylon, not 

Jerusalem. 

If the seventy years refer to the Babylonian rule, as these verses 

show, this period ended with the fall of Babylon in 539 B.C.E.; and 

this is directly stated at Jeremiah 25:12: “Then after seventy years 

are completed, I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation.” 

(NRSV) As this punishment took place in 539 B.C.E., the end of 

the seventy years cannot be extended beyond that date, either to 

537 B.C.E. or any other date, as that would be in conflict with a 

direct reading of Jeremiah 25:12. 40 

There cannot be any doubt whatsoever about the matter: The 

most direct reading of Jeremiah’s prophecy (Jeremiah 25:11–12 and 

29:10) is in clear conflict with the application that the Watch Tower 

Society gives to the seventy years. In spite of this, it boldly declares: 

But the Bible itself provides even more telling evidence against 

the claim that the 70 years began in 605 B.C.E. and that Jerusalem 

was destroyed in 587/6 B.C.E. 41 

What “telling evidence”? This: 

As mentioned, if we were to count from 605 B.C.E., the 70 

years would reach down to 535 B.C.E. However, the inspired Bible 

writer Ezra reported that the 70 years ran until “the first year of 

Cyrus the king of Persia,” who issued a decree allowing the Jews to 

return to their homeland. 42 

But did Ezra really report that? As was shown in the discussion 

of 2 Chronicles 36:21–23 in Chapter 5, Ezra does not clearly indicate 

39 As is shown in the Appendix for Chapter 5, “The ‘third year of Jehoiakim’ (Daniel 

1:12),” these texts also include Daniel 1:1–2 and 2:1. 

40 For a full discussion of the texts dealing with the seventy years, see Chapter 5 of 

the present work. 

41 “Let Your Kingdom Come,” pp. 188–189. 

42 Ibid., p. 189.


that the seventy years ended “in the first year of Cyrus,” or in 537, 

as the Watch Tower Society holds. On the contrary, such an 

understanding of his words would be in direct conflict with 

Jeremiah 25:12, where the seventy years are ended in 539 B.C.E.! 

This scripture provides the most telling evidence against the claim 

that the seventy years ended in 537 B.C.E. or in any other year after 

539. 

It is true that in the original manuscript of The Gentile Times 

Reconsidered (sent to the Society in 1977), one of the possible 

applications of the seventy years considered was that they could be 

counted from 605 to 536/35 B.C.E. But this application was 

presented as a less likely alternative. In the published editions of 

the work this suggestion has been omitted because, like the 

application of the period advocated by the Watch Tower Society, it 

was found to be in clear conflict with Jeremiah’s prophecy. In 

discussing this application, the Society argues that “there is no 

reasonable way of stretching Cyrus’ first year from 538 down to 

535 B.C.E.” 43 As the application discussed did not imply this, and 

as I am not aware of any other modem commentator that attempts 

to stretch Cyrus’ first year “down to 535 B.C.E.,” this statement 

seems to be nothing but a “straw man” created by the Watch 

Tower Society itself. Although an argument directed against such a 

fabricated “straw man” may easily knock it down, the argument 

completely misses the real target. 44 

Finally, the Watch Tower Society claims, 

. . . we are willing to be guided primarily by God’s Word 

rather than by a chronology that is based principally on secular 

evidence or that disagrees with the Scriptures. It seems evident that 

the easiest and most direct understanding of the various Biblical 

statements is that the 70 years began with the complete desolation 

of Judah after Jerusalem was destroyed. 45 

Again, these statements tend to give the impression that there is 

a conflict between the Bible and the secular evidence on the 

43 Ibid. 

44 Most commentators end the seventy years either with the fall of Babylon in 539 

B.C.E., with Cyrus’ decree in 538, with the return of the first Jewish remnant to 

Palestine in 538 or 537 (Ezra 3:1–2), or with the commencing of the reconstruction 

of the temple in 536 (Ezra 3:8–10). (Cf. Professor J. Barton Payne, Encyclopedia of 

Biblical Prophecy, Grand Rapids: Baker Books, the 1980 reprint of the 1973 

edition, p. 339.) Curiously, these alternatives (except for the Watch Tower Society’s 

own 537 B.C.E. date) are not even mentioned in the “Appendix” to “Let Your 

Kingdom Come”! 

45 “Let Your Kingdom Came,” p. 189.


seventy years, and that the Watch Tower Society faithfully stands 

for the Bible against secular evidence. But nothing could be further 

from the truth. On the contrary, biblical and historical data are in 

good agreement on the period under discussion. Here, historical 

and archaeological discoveries, as in so many other cases, uphold and 

confirm biblical statements. On the other hand the interpretation of 

the seventy-year period given by the Watch Tower Society does 

conflict with facts established by secular evidence. As has been 

clearly demonstrated above and in Chapter 5, it is also in flagrant 

conflict with the “easiest and most direct understanding of the 

various Biblical statements” on the seventy years, such as Jeremiah 

25: 11–12; 29:10; Daniel 1:16; 2:1; and Zechariah 1:7,12, and 7:1–5. 

The real conflict, therefore, is not between the Bible and secular 

evidence, but between the Bible and secular evidence on the one 

hand, and the Watch Tower Society on the other. As its application 

of the seventy years is in conflict both with the Bible and the 

historical facts, it has nothing to do with reality and merits rejection by 

all sincere truth-seekers. 

SUMMARY 

It has been amply demonstrated above that the Watch Tower 

Society in its “Appendix” to “Let your Kingdom Come” does not give 

a fair presentation of the evidence against their 607 B.C.E. date: 

(1) Its writers misrepresent historical evidence by omitting from 

their discussion nearly half of the evidence presented in the first 

edition of this work (the Hillah stele, the diary BM 32312, and 

contemporary Egyptian documents) and by giving some of the 

other lines of evidence only a biased and distorted presentation. 

They erroneously indicate that priests and kings might have altered 

historical documents (chronicles, royal inscriptions, etc.) from the 

Neo-Babylonian era, in spite of the fact that all available evidence 

shows the opposite to be true. 

(2) They misrepresent authorities on ancient historiography by quoting 

them out of context and attributing to them views and doubts they 

do not have. 

(3) They misrepresent ancient writers by concealing the fact that 

Berossus is supported by the most direct reading of Daniel 1:1–6, 

by quoting Josephus when he talks of seventy years of desolation 

without mentioning that in his last work he changed the length of 

the period to fifty years, and by referring to the opinion of the


second century bishop, Theophilus, without mentioning that he 

ends the seventy years, not only in the second year of Cyrus, but 

also in the second year of Darius Hystaspes (as did his 

contemporary Clement of Alexandria and others), thus confusing 

the two kings. 

Finally, (4) they misrepresent biblical evidence by concealing the 

fact that the most direct understanding of the passages dealing with 

the seventy years shows them to be the period of Neo-Babylonian 

rule, not the period of Jerusalem’s desolation. This understanding is 

in good agreement with the historical evidence, but in glaring 

conflict with the application given to it by the Watch Tower 

Society. It is truly distressing to discover that individuals, upon 

whose spiritual guidance millions rely, deal so carelessly and 

dishonestly with facts. Their “Appendix” to “Let Your Kingdom 

Come” in defence of their chronology is nothing but yet one more 

nefarious exercise in the art of concealing truth. 

It may be asked why the leaders of an organization that 

constantly emphasizes its interest in “the Truth” in reality find it 

necessary to suppress the truth and even oppose it? 

The obvious reason is that they have no other choice, as long as 

they insist that their organization was appointed in the year 1919 as God’s 

sole channel and mouthpiece on earth. If the 607 B.C.E.–1914 C.E. 

calculation is abandoned, this claim will fall. Then these leaders will 

have to admit, at least tacitly, that their organization for the past 

hundred years has appeared on the world scene in a false role with 

a false message. 

When occasionally the questioning of the 607 B.C.E. date has 

been commented upon in the Watch Tower publications in recent 

years, the sole defense has been a reference to the “Appendix” of 

1981. In The Watchtower of November 1, 1986, for example, it is 

claimed that “in 1981 Jehovah’s Witnesses published convincing 

evidence in support of the 607 B.C.E. date.” Then the reader is 

referred to the book “Let Your Kingdom Come,” pages 127–40 and 

186–89. 46 

As the Society’s “Appendix” only contains a series of failed 

attempts to undermine the evidence against the 607 B.C.E. date, 

and as the only “convincing evidence” presented in support of the 

date is a reference to “yet undiscovered material,” the Watch 

Tower writers evidently trust that the majority of the Witnesses are 

completely unaware of the actual facts. And the leaders of the 

46 The Watchtower, November 1,1986, p. 6. (Emphasis added.) A similar reference to 

the “Appendix” is found in the Watchtower of March 15, 1989, p. 22.


When Did the "Seven Times" 

Really End? 

Some people argue that even if the "seven 

times" are prophetic and even if they last 2,520 

years, Jehovah’s Witnesses are still mistaken 

about the significance of 1914 because they use 

the wrong starting point. Jerusalem, they claim, 

was destroyed in 587/6 B.C.E., not in 607 

B.C.E. If true, this would shift the start of "the 

time of the end" by some 20 years. However, in 

1981 Jehovah’s Witnesses published 

convincing evidence in support of the 607 B.C.E. 

date. ("Let Your Kingdom Come," pages 127-40, 

186-9) Besides, can those trying to rob 1914 

of its Biblical significance prove that 1934—or 

any other year for that matter—has had a 

more profound, more dramatic, and more 

spectacular impact upon world history than 

1914 did? 

From The Watchtower of November 1, 1986, page 6. 

Watch Tower Society want to keep it that way. This is clear from 

the warnings repeatedly published in the Watch Tower publications 

against reading literature by former Witnesses who know the facts 

about their chronology. The leaders of the Watch Tower Society 

evidently fear that if Witnesses are allowed to be exposed to these 

facts, they might discover that the basis of the prophetic claims of 

the movement is nothing but a groundless, unbiblical and 

unhistorical chronological speculation. 

Thus, although the Watch Tower organization probably uses the 

word “Truth” more often than most other organizations on earth, 

the fact is that truth has become an enemy of the movement. 

Therefore it has to be resisted and concealed. 

Anybody, of course, be it an individual or an organization, is 

fully entitled to believe whatever he/she/it prefers to believe, as


long as it does not hurt other people—that flying saucers exist, that 

the earth is flat, or, in this case, that Jerusalem, contrary to all the 

evidence, was desolated in 607 B.C.E., and that, somewhere, there 

may be “yet undiscovered material” to support such views. 

If, however, such “believers” are not willing to concede to 

others the right to disagree with their theories, and instead classify 

those who no longer are able to embrace their views as godless 

apostates, condemn them to Gehenna if they do not change their 

minds, force their friends and relatives to regard them as wicked 

ungodly criminals that must be avoided, shunned and even hated, 

explaining that God will shortly exterminate them forever together 

with the rest of mankind—then it is high time for such “believers” 

to be held responsible for their views, attitudes and deeds. Any 

faith leading to such grave consequences for other people must 

first clearly be shown to be securely rooted in actual reality, not just 

in untenable speculations that can be supported only by “yet 

undiscovered material.” 

B. UNOFFICIAL DEFENSES 

WRITTEN BY SCHOLARLY WITNESSES 

The “Appendix” of 1981 is so far the only official attempt by the 

Watch Tower Society to overcome the lines of evidence against the 

607 B.C.E. date presented in The Gentile Times Reconsidered. 

Evidently realizing that the Society’s defense is hopelessly 

inadequate, some scholarly Jehovah’s Witnesses and members of 

other Bible Student groups have on their own initiative set about to 

work out papers in defense of the Gentile times chronology. About 

half a dozen of such papers have come to my attention. Most of 

them have been sent to me by Jehovah’s Witnesses who have read 

them and wanted to know my opinion about them. 

A common feature of these papers is their lack of objectivity. 

They all start with a preconceived idea that has to be defended at 

all costs. Another common feature is that the papers time and 

again reflect inadequate research, often resulting in serious 

mistakes. Unfortunately, some of the papers also repeatedly resort 

to defaming language. In scholarly publications authors usually 

treat each other with respect, and critical papers are regarded as 

constructive contributions to the ongoing debate. Should it not be 

expected that Christians, too, refrain from using disparaging and 

disgraceful language in referring to sincere critics? Classifying them 

as “detractors,” “ridiculers,” and so on, is the very opposite of the 

attitude recommended by the apostle Peter at 1 Peter 3:15.


As the most important arguments presented in the papers that 

have come to my attention have already been considered in their 

proper contexts in the present work, there is no need to deal with 

them again here. A brief description of the papers composed by 

two of the most qualified defenders of the Watch Tower Society’s 

chronology may be of interest to readers and is given below. 47 

Rolf Furuli is a Jehovah’s Witness who lives in Oslo, Norway. He 

is a former district overseer and is regarded by Norwegian 

Witnesses as the leading apologist of Watch Tower teachings in 

that country, and Witnesses often turn to him with their doctrinal 

problems. It is not to be wondered at, therefore, that he has seen it 

as an important task to “refute” my work on the Watch Tower 

Society’s Gentile times chronology. 

Furuli’s first attempt of that sort, a paper of more than one 

hundred pages called “Den nybabyloniske kronologi og Bibelen” (”The 

Neo-Babylonian Chronology and the Bible”), was sent to me by 

Witnesses in Norway in 1987. Like the Watch Tower Society in its 

“Appendix,” Furuli attempted to undermine the reliability of the 

historical sources for the Neo-Babylonian chronology presented in 

my work. To meet the wishes of the Norwegian Witnesses (who 

had contacted me in secret), I decided to write a reply to Furuli’s 

paper. 

The first 31 pages of my reply (which in all finally amounted to 

93 pages) were sent in the spring of 1987 to the Norwegian 

Witnesses, who soon provided Rolf Furuli with a copy, too. Furuli 

quickly realized that his discussion had been shown to be 

untenable, and if he continued to circulate his paper, my reply 

would be circulated, too. To prevent this, he wrote me a letter, 

dated April 23, 1987, in which he described his paper as just 

“private notes” which “not in all details” represented his “present 

views” but was solely an expression of the information available to 

him at the time it was written. He asked me to destroy my copy of 

his paper and never quote from it again. 48 

47 According to the information I have, John Albu in New York is probably the Watch 

Tower chronologist who was most deeply read in Neo-Babylonian history. Some 

years ago I was told that he has prepared some material in defense of the 607 

B.C.E. date, but up till now nothing of it has come to my attention. Albu died in 

2004. 

48 As I later found out that Furuli continued to share his paper with Witnesses who 

had begun to question the Society’s chronology, I saw no reason to stop the 

circulation of my reply to it. 

A main point in Furuli’s argumentation was that the dates on some cuneiform 

documents from the Neo-Babylonian era create “overlaps” of a few months between 

some of the reigns, which he regarded as proof that extra years must be added to 

these reigns. These “overlaps” are discussed in the Appendix for chapter 3 of the 

present work.


Three years later Furuli had prepared a second paper aimed at 

overthrowing the evidence presented in my work. For some time 

Furuli had been studying Hebrew at the university in Oslo, and in 

his new paper of 36 pages (dated February 1, 1990) he tried to 

argue that my discussion of the seventy years “for Babylon” was in 

conflict with the original Hebrew text. 

It was evident, though, that Furuli’s knowledge of Hebrew at 

that time was very imperfect. Having consulted with a number of 

leading Scandinavian Hebraists, I wrote a reply of 69 pages, 

demonstrating in detail that his arguments throughout were based 

on a misunderstanding of the Hebrew language. As Furuli in his 

discussion had questioned the reliability of the Hebrew Masoretic 

text (MT) of the book of Jeremiah, my reply also included a 

defense of this text against the Greek Septuagint text (LXX) of the 

book. 

In 2003 Furuli published a book of 250 pages on the Persian 

chronology, which is basically a defence of the erroneous Watch 

Tower dating of the reign of Artaxerxes I. Also included is a 

section of 18 pages containing another linguistically untenable 

discussion of the Biblical 70-year passages. 49 

Philip Couture, a Jehovah’s Witness who resides in California, 

USA, has been a member of the Watch Tower movement since 

1947. He has for years been doing research on Neo-Babylonian 

history and chronology, evidently in order to find some support for 

the 607 B.C.E. date. 

In the autumn of 1989 a friend in New Jersey, U.S.A., sent me a 

copy of a treatise of 72 pages (which included a section with pages 

copied from various works) entitled A Study of Watchtower Neo- 

Babylonian Chronology in the Light of Ancient Sources. It was written by 

an anonymous Watch Tower apologist, and I did not notice until 

much later that my friend had enclosed a slip of paper stating that 

the author was Philip Couture. 50 

Although Couture carefully avoids mention of my work, he 

repeatedly quotes from it or alludes to its contents. The reason is, 

quite evidently, that he is not supposed to have read what in the 

Watch Tower publications is classified as “apostate literature.” The 

only critic that Couture mentions by name is a Seventh-Day 

49 Rolf Furuli, Persian Chronology and the Length of the Babylonian Exile of the Jews 

(Oslo: R. Furuli A/S, 2003). For a review of the book, see the Appendix. 

50 This was also confirmed to me by Professor John A. Brinkman at the University of 

Chicago, a letter from whom to Couture had been included in the treatise (with the 

name of the addressee removed).


Adventist, William MacCarty, who wrote a booklet on the Watch 

Tower Society’s Gentile times calculation back in 1975. 51 

Like Furuli’s first paper, Couture’s treatise is an attempt to 

undermine the reliability of the historical sources for the Neo- 

Babylonian chronology. Despite his efforts, however, he fails to 

come up with even one tenable argument that can move the 

burden of evidence against the 607 B.C.E. date. The reason for this 

simply is that, however skilful and capable a person may be, it will 

in the end be impossible for him to find any real and valid support 

for an idea that is false and therefore impossible to defend. 

About half of Couture’s treatise deals with astronomy and its 

relation to Neo-Babylonian chronology. Unfortunately, this is an 

area that Couture was not quite familiar with. Thus, although a 

separate section of his paper contains a “word of caution” 

regarding “the use and abuse of eclipses,” he himself repeatedly 

falls into the very pitfalls against which he warns. 52 

As this and other important points brought up by Couture have 

been dealt with in various sections of the present work, no further 

comments on his treatise are given here. 53 I do not know if 

Couture is still prepared to defend his position. 

Some of the other papers sent to me present discussions of the 

Biblical passages on the seventy years, but ignore the historical 

evidence against the 607 B.C.E. date. 54 Such a discussion is not, as 

the author of the paper may intimate, an attempt to defend the 

51 William MacCarty,1914 and Christ’s Second Coming (Washington, D.C.: Review and 

Herald Publishing Association, 1975). 

52 One example of this is his discussion of the lunar eclipse on Ululu 13 of the second 

year of Nabonidus, described in the royal inscription Nabon. No. 18, which modern 

astronomers have identified with the one that took place on September 26, 554 

B.C.E. (This eclipse is discussed in Chapter 3 of the present work, section B-1-c.) 

On page 11 of his treatise, Couture claims that “within a few years either direction 

there are a number of other lunar eclipses which are just as possible.” But at none 

of the six alternative eclipses presented by Couture (dating from 563 to 543 B.C.E.) 

did the moon set heliacally, as is explicitly stated in the inscription, and three of 

them were not even visible in Babylonia! Such errors reveal that Couture did not 

know how to calculate and identify ancient lunar eclipses. 

53 For readers who have read Couture’s treatise and are interested in my response to 

it, a separate, detailed refutation is available at a charge to cover copying costs and 

postage. 

54 One example of this is a book of 136 pages written by Charles F. Redeker, The 

Biblical 70 Years. A Look at the Exile and Desolation Periods (Southfield, Michigan: 

Zion’s Tower of the Morning, 1993). Redeker is a member of the Dawn Bible 

Students, a conservative Bible Student offshoot of the Watchtower organization 

formed in the early 1930’s in reaction to the many changes of Russell’s teachings 

introduced by the Watch Tower Society’s second president, Joseph F. Rutherford.


Bible against attacks founded upon secular sources. Rather, it is an 

attempt to force the meaning of the Biblical texts to adapt them to 

a theory that is in glaring conflict with all historical sources from the 

Neo-Babylonian period. The choice in such discussions is not really 

between the Bible and secular sources; it is between the rantings of 

over-exalted minds and the historical evidence. As long as the 

historical reality is ignored, such discussions amount to little more 

than futile exercises in escapism or wishful thinking. 

It is to be expected that the attempts to overcome the historical 

evidence against the 607 B.C.E. date presented in this work will 

continue. New discussions, prepared by the Watch Tower Society 

and/or other defenders of the 607 B.C.E.–1914 C.E. calculation 

will probably appear in the future. If, at least on the surface, some 

arguments presented in such discussions appear to have some 

strength, they will have to be critically examined and evaluated. If it 

turns out to be necessary, a running commentary on such 

discussions will be made available on the Internet.

For Chapter One: 

APPENDIX 

ADDITIONAL NOTES ON THE SECOND ADVENT MOVEMENT 

As noted on page 43, along with intense interest in time 

prophecies, the Second Advent movement was also characterized 

by a number of other distinctive factors. 

Many of the Second Adventist splinter groups that branched off 

from the original Millerites rejected the immortal soul and hell 

doctrines (and even the trinity doctrine). This was due largely to the 

articles and tracts published in the 1820’s, 1830’s, and 1840’s by a 

former Baptist pastor, Henry Grew of Hartford, Connecticut and 

later of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 1 

The doctrine of “conditional immortality” was first introduced 

among the Millerites by George Storrs. It was the reading of one of 

Grew’s tracts in 1837 that turned Storrs against the immortal soul 

and hell doctrines, and he was later to become the leading 

champion in the United States of conditionalism. 

Typical of many Second Adventist periodicals, the World’s Crisis 

advocated conditionalism, the doctrine of the conditional―not 

inherent—immortality of the human soul, with its corollary tenet 

that the ultimate destiny of those who are rejected by God is 

destruction or annihilation, not conscious torment. The World’s 

Crisis had advocated the date of 1854 for Christ’s second coming 

and when, like all the preceding dates, this date failed, the 

“immortality question” came strongly to the fore and caused a 

second major division within the original movement. 

1 LeRoy Edwin Froom, The Conditionalist Faith of Our Fathers, Washington D.C.: 

Review and Herald, 1965, pp. 300–315. Grew’s anti-trinitarian position, too, was 

adopted by a majority of the Second Adventists, including the three major 

Adventist groups that branched off from the “original” Adventists: 1) the Seventh- 

Day Adventists, 2) the Advent Christians, and 3) the “age to come” Adventists. In 

1898 the SDA Church, on the authority of Ellen G. White, the “prophetess” of this 

movement, changed its position on the question. (Erwin Roy Gane, The Arian or 

Anti-Trinitarian Views Presented in Seventh-Day Adventist Literature and the Ellen 

G. White Answer, unpublished M.A. thesis, Andrews University, June 1963, pp. 1– 

110) Some decades later, the Advent Christian Church, too, began to reconsider its 

anti-trinitarian position.—See David Arnold Dean, Echoes of the Midnight Cry: The 

Millerite Heritage in the Apologetics of the Advent Christian Denomination, 1860– 

1960 (unpublished Th.D. dissertation, Westminster Theological Seminary, 1976) 

pp. 406–416. 

312

Appendix 313 

Although the doctrine of conditional immortality eventually was 

adopted by a majority of the Second Adventists, it was never 

accepted by the leadership of the original movement, which 

increasingly began to condemn it as a heresy in their periodical, the 

Advent Herald. Finally, in 1858, the original Second Adventists, or 

the “Evangelical Adventists,” as they now called themselves, 

openly broke with the “conditionalist” Adventists and formed a 

separate organization, The American Evangelical Advent Conference. The 

Evangelical Adventists, however, soon became a minority, as their 

members in increasing numbers sided with the “conditionalist” 

Adventists. The association finally died out in the early years of the 

20th century. 2 

After the break with the Evangelical Adventists, the supporters 

of the World’s Crisis, too, formed a separate denomination in 1860, 

The Advent Christian Association (later “The Advent Christian 

Church”), today the most important Adventist denomination aside 

from the Seventh-Day Adventists and Jehovah’s Witnesses. 3 

Many “conditionalist” Adventists did not join this association, 

however, partly because they were strongly opposed to all forms of 

structured church organization and would accept no names of their 

church but the “Church of God,” and partly also because of their 

distinctive “age to come” views, that is, that the Jews would be 

restored to Palestine before the coming of Christ, that his coming 

would usher in the millenium, and that the saints would reign with 

Christ for a thousand years, during which period his kingdom 

2 David Tallmadge Arthur, “Come out of Babylon”: A Study of Millerite Separatism 

and Denominationalism, 1840–1865 (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of 

Rochester, 1970), pp. 291–306; Isaac C. Wellcome, History of the Second Advent 

Message (Yarmouth [Maine], Boston, New York, London, 1874), pp. 597–600, 609, 

610. See also the excellent overview by D. A. Dean, op. cit., pp. 122–129. Even 

Joshua V. Himes, editor of the Advent Herald and the most influential leader of the 

original movement after the death of Miller in 1849, adopted the “conditionalist” 

position in 1862 and left the Evangelical Adventists. 

3 Numerically, the membership of this church has remained at about 30,000–50,000 

throughout its history. The two most influential leaders and writers at the 

formation of the association were H. L. Hastings and Miles Grant, the latter being 

editor of the World’s Crisis from 1856 to 1876. Hastings left the association in 

1865 and remained independent of all associations for the rest of his life, although 

he continued to advocate conditionalism and other teachings of the Advent 

Christian denomination. (See Dean, op. cit., pp. 133–135, 142, 210–294.)


would be set up on earth. By the early 1860’s, these Adventists had 

been separated from the Advent Christians. 4 

In 1863 another group of “conditionalist” Adventists, headed by 

Rufus Wendell, George Storrs, R. E. Ladd, W. S. Campbell, and 

others, broke with the Advent Christian Association and formed a 

new denomination, The Life and Advent Union. This group 

promulgated the view that only the righteous would be resurrected 

at Christ’s coming. The wicked dead would remain in their graves 

forever. They also denied the personality of the holy spirit and even 

of the devil. For the promotion of these teachings, they started a 

new paper, Herald of Life and of the Coming Kingdom, with Storrs as 

editor. 5 Storrs later changed his view of the resurrection and left 

the group in 1871, resuming the publishing of his earlier Bible 

Examiner magazine. 

For Chapter Two: 

METHODS OF RECKONING REGNAL YEARS 

The accession and nonaccession year systems 

Babylon, and later Medo-Persia, applied the accession year system, in 

which the year during which a king came to power was reckoned as 

his accession year, and the next year beginning on Nisan 1 (spring), 

was reckoned as his first year. 

In Egypt the opposite method was applied: the year in which a 

king came to power was counted as his first year. There is evidence 

to show that the latter method, the nonaccession year system, was also 

applied in the kingdom of Judah. The evidence is as follows: 

1. The battle of Carchemish in 605 B.C.E., when the army of 

Pharaoh Neco of Egypt was defeated by Nebuchadnezzar, is stated 

at Jeremiah 46:2 as having occurred “in the fourth year of Jehoiakim 

4 The leading advocate of these views was Joseph Marsh in Rochester, N.Y., editor of 

the Advent Harbinger and Bible Advocate (in 1854 changed to Prophetic Expositor 

and Bible Advocate). See also D. T. Arthur, op. cit., pp. 224–227, 352–371. Henry 

Grew as well as Bible translator Benjamin Wilson both associated with this group. 

(Historical Waymarks of the Church of God, Oregon, Illinois: Church of God General 

Conference, 1976, pp. 51–53) Due to their opposition to all church organization, 

the “age to come” Adventists were very loosely associated. A more stable 

organization was not formed until 1921, when the Church of God of the Abrahamic 

Faith was organized with headquarters in Oregon, Illinois. — D. T. Arthur, op. cit., 

p. 371. 

5 D. A. Dean, op. cit., pp. 135–138; D. T. Arthur, op. cit ., pp.349–351. The Life and 

Advent Union lived on until 1964, when it merged again with the Advent Christian 

Church.

Appendix 315 

the son of Josiah, king of Judah.” According to Jeremiah 25:1 “the 

fourth year of Jehoiakim . . . was the first year of Nebuchadnezzar.” 

But the Neo-Babylonian Chronicle 5 (B.M. 21946) clearly states that 

this battle took place in Nebuchadnezzar’s accession year, not in his 

first year. 6 The reason why Jeremiah reckons Nebuchadnezzar’s 

accession year as his first year seems to be that Judah did not apply 

the accession year system. Jeremiah, therefore, applied the Jewish 

non-accession year system not only to Jehoiakim, but also to 


2. In 2 Kings 24:12; 25:8, and Jeremiah 52:12 Jehoiachin’s 

deportation and the destruction of Jerusalem are said to have taken 

place in Nebuchadnezzar’s eighth and nineteenth regnal years, while 

Jeremiah 52:28–30 seems to put these events in Nebuchadnezzar’s 

seventh and eighteenth years, respectively. The difference in both cases 

is one year. The Neo-Babylonian Chronicle 5 is in agreement with 

Jeremiah 52:28 in stating that Nebuchadnezzar seized Jerusalem 

and captured Jehoiachin in his seventh year. 

There is evidence to show that the last chapter of Jeremiah, 

chapter 52, was not authored by Jeremiah himself. This is clearly 

indicated by the concluding statement of the preceding chapter 

(Jeremiah 51:64): “Thus far are the words of Jeremiah.” Chapter 

52, in fact, is almost word for word taken from 2 Kings 24:18– 

25:30, the only exception being Jeremiah 52:28–30, the verses containing 

the divergence of one year in the reference to Nebuchadnezzar’s 

regnal years. 7 Professor Albertus Pieters in all probability gives the 

correct explanation of this difference when he states: 

This difference is perfectly explained if we assume that the 

section in question was added to the prophecies of Jeremiah by 

someone in Babylon who had access to an official report or record, 

in which the date would, of course, be set down according to the 

Babylonian reckoning. 8 

6 The Neo-Babylonian chronicles are discussed in Chapter Three, section B-1. 

7 It cannot be determined whether chapter 52 was added by Jeremiah himself, his 

scribe Baruch, or some other person. The reason why this section from 2 Kings 

was included may have been “to show how Jeremiah’s prophecies were fulfilled.”— 

Dr. J. A. Thompson, The Book of Jeremiah (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdman’s 

Publishing Co., 1980), pp. 773, 774. 

8 Albertus Pieters, “The Third Year of Jehoiakim,” in From the Pyramids to Paul, ed. 

by Lewis Gaston Leary (New York: Thomas Nelson and Sons, 1935), p. 186. That 

the information in Jeremiah 52:28–30 may have been added to the book of 

Jeremiah in Babylonia is also supported by the fact that the Greek Septuagint 

(LXX) version of Jeremiah, which was produced in Egypt (perhaps from a 

manuscript preserved by the Jews in that country), does not include these verses.


The compiler of Jeremiah 52, then, faithfully reproduced the 

dates found in his two sources, even if those sources reflected two 

different ways of reckoning regnal years: the accession year system 

used by the Babylonians, and the nonaccession year system used by 

the Jews. 

The last four verses of chapter 52 of Jeremiah (verses 31–34), 

although taken verbatim from 2 Kings 25:27–30, also reflects the 

accession year system, which may be explained by the fact that the 

passage reproduces information that originally must have been 

received from Babylonia. As stated in this passage, Evil-merodach 

(Awel-Marduk), “in the year of his becoming king,” released the 

Judean king Jehoiachin from prison in the 37th year of his exile. 

According to Professor Pieters the clause “in the year of his 

becoming king” (Jeremiah 52:31) “is the technically correct term 

for the year of the monarch’s accession,” 9 the Babylonian 

documents using a similar expression when referring to the 

accession year. 

That the writer of the passage in Jeremiah 52:28–34 used the 

accession year system is thus the conclusion of a number of 

modern Biblical scholars. 10 

3. The accession year system is most probably also employed by 

the prophet Daniel at Daniel 1:1, where he dates the first 

deportation of Jewish exiles to the “third year” of Jehoiakim. This 

deportation, however, must have followed upon the battle of 

Carchemish, the victory there paving the way for 

Nebuchadnezzar’s invasion and conquest of the countries in the 

west, including Judah. 

As noted above, this battle is dated at Jeremiah 46:2 to the ‘fourth 

year” of Jehoiakim, not to his third. Most commentators, therefore, 

choose to regard the “third year” of Daniel 1:1 as a historical 

blunder by the author of the book, and as indicating that he was 

not contemporary with the event, but was writing hundreds of 

years afterwards. Some, including the Watch Tower Society, argue 

that the deportation mentioned in the text was identical with the 

one that occurred eight years later, after the end of Jehoiakim’s 

11th year of reign, when his son and successor Jehoiachin was 

exiled to Babylon. 11 

9 Pieters, op. cit., p. 184. 

10 See, for example, John Bright, The Anchor Bible: Jeremiah (N.Y.: Doubleday, 1965), 

p. 369; J. A. Thompson, op. cit., p.782, and J. Philip Hyatt, “New Light on 

Nebuchadnezzar and Judean History,” Journal of Biblical Literature, Vol. 75 (1956), 

p. 278. 

11 Insight an the Scriptures, Vol. 1 (Brooklyn, New York: Watchtower Bible and Tract 

Society of New York, Inc., 1988), p. 1269. A detailed examination of this theory is 

presented in the Appendix for Chapter Five: “The ‘third year of Jehoiakim’ (Daniel 

1:1, 2).”

Appendix 317 

However, if it is accepted that Daniel was living in Babylon in 

the Neo-Babylonian period and was occupying a high rank in its 

administration, it would have been natural for him to apply the 

Babylonian calendar and their system of reckoning regnal years, 

and to do this as well when referring to the reigns of non- 

Babylonian kings, including Jehoiakim, just as Jeremiah, living in 

Judea, conversely applied the Jewish nonaccession year system in 

referring to Nebuchadnezzar’s reign. 

4. The Babylonian calendar was also used (alongside the 

Egyptian civil calendar) by the Jewish colony at Elephantine in s. 

Egypt from the 5th century onward, as has been established by Dr. 

Bezalel Porten and others. Dr. Sacha Stern concludes that, “Non- 

Jewish or ‘official’ calendars were routinely used by Diaspora Jews 

throughout the whole of Antiquity.” 12 

Several difficult problems in Biblical chronology are easily 

solved if the accession and nonaccession year systems are taken 

into consideration. A study of the chronological tables in the final 

section of this Appendix (“Chronological tables covering the 

seventy years”) will make this clear. 

Nisan and Tishri years 

It is well established that the Assyrian, Babylonian and Persian 

calendar started on Nisan 1 (the first day of the month Nisan in the 

spring), which was also the beginning of the regnal years. The Jews, 

in later times, had two beginnings of their calendar years: Nisan 1 

in the spring and Tishri 1 six months later in the autumn—Tishri 1 

being the older new-year day. 13 Although Nisan was the beginning 

of the sacred calendar year, and the months were always numbered 

from it, 14 Tishri was retained as the beginning of the secular calendar 

year. 

The problem is: Did the kings of Judah follow the custom of 

Babylon and other countries in reckoning the regnal years from 

Nisan 1, or did they reckon them from Tishri, the beginning of 

their secular year? Although scholars disagree on this, there is 

evidence to show that the kings of Judah reckoned their regnal 

years on a Tishri-to-Tishri basis. 

12 Sacha Stern, “The Babylonian Calendar at Elephantine,” Zeitschrift far Papyrologie 

and Epigraphik, Band 130 (2000), p. 159. 

13 J. D. Douglas, ed., New Bible Dictionary, 2nd ed. (Leicester, England : Inter-Varsity 

Press, 1982), p. 159; compare Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 1, p. 391. 

14 “In the Hebrew Scriptures the months are numbered from Nisan, regardless of 

whether the reckoning of the year was from spring or fall.” — Edwin R. Thiele, The 

Mysterious Numbers of the Hebrew Kings, revised edition (Grand Rapids: 

Zondervan Publishing House, 1983), p. 52. In footnote 11 on the same page he 

gives many examples of this.


1. Jeremiah 1:3 states that the inhabitants of Jerusalem, after the 

desolation of the city, “went into exile in the fifth month,” which is 

also in agreement with the record in 2 Kings 25:8–12. Yet this fifth 

month is said to have been at “the end of the eleventh year of 

Zedekiah.” 15 Only if the regnal years were reckoned as beginning 

from Tishri (the seventh month) could the fifth month be said to 

be at “the end of’ Zedekiah’s eleventh regnal year, which then 

ended with the next month, Elul, the sixth month. 

2. According to 2 Kings 22:3–10 King Josiah of Judah, in his 

eighteenth year, began repairs on the temple of Jerusalem. During 

these repairs High Priest Hilkiah found “the book of the law” in 

the temple. 16 This discovery resulted in an extensive campaign 

against idolatry throughout the whole land. After that Josiah 

reinstituted the passover on Nisan 14, two weeks after the 

beginning of the new year according to the sacred calendar. Very 

interestingly, this passover is said to have been celebrated “in the 

eighteenth year of King Josiah.” (2 Kings 23:21–23) As the repairs of 

the temple, the cleansing of the land from idolatry and many other 

things recorded in 2 Kings 22:3–23:23 could not reasonably have 

occurred within just two weeks, it seems obvious that Josiah’s 

eighteenth regnal year was not counted from Nisan 1, but from 

Tishri 1. 

3. Another indication of a Tishri reckoning of regnal years in 

Judah is given in Jeremiah 36. In “the fourth year of Jehoiakim” 

(verse 1), Yahweh told Jeremiah to write in a book all the words he 

had spoken to him against Israel, Judah, and all the nations (verse 

2). This Jeremiah did through Baruch, his secretary (verse 4). When 

Baruch had finished the work, Jeremiah asked him to “go, and 

from the scroll you wrote at my dictation, read all the words of 

Yahweh to the people in his Temple on the day of the fast.” 

(Jeremiah 36:5, 6, JB). Which fast? 

This was evidently a special fast proclaimed for some 

unspecified reason. Most probably the reason was the battle of 

Carchemish in May–June that same year, “in the fourth year of 

Jehoiakim” (Jeremiah 46:2), and the subsequent events, including 

the siege laid against Jerusalem in the same year according to 

15 KIV, ASV, NASB, and other versions. The New World Translation (NW) uses the 

word “completion”: “until the completion of the eleventh year of Zedekiah the son of 

Josiah, the king of Judah, until Jerusalem went into exile in the fifth month “ 

16 As argued by many commentators, the “book of the law” probably was the book of 

Deuteronomy, which may have been lost for some time, but was now rediscovered. 

Cf. Professor Donald J. Wiseman, 1 and 2 Kings (Leicester: Inter-Varsity Press, 

1993), pp. 294–296.

Appendix 319 

Daniel 1:1. Though Nebuchadnezzar by now, due to the death of 

his father, had returned to Babylon (as recorded in the Neo- 

Babylonian Chronicle 5), the Jews had good reasons for fearing that 

he soon would return and continue his operations in Judah and the 

surrounding areas. Against this background, a “summons to a fast 

in the presence of Yahweh for the whole population of Jerusalem 

and for all the people who could come to Jerusalem from the 

towns of Judah” (Jeremiah 36:9, JB) is quite understandable. Very 

interestingly, this fast, at which Baruch was to read aloud from the 

scroll he had written, took place “in the fifth year of Jehoiakim the 

son of Josiah, the king of Judah, in the ninth month,” according to the 

same verse. 

If Jehoiakim’s regnal years were counted from Nisan, the first 

month, Baruch began to write down Jeremiah’s prophecies about a 

year prior to this fast. Besides, it seems to have been proclaimed 

already in the fourth year of Jehoiakim (verses 1, 6), and thus about 

nine months before it was held. All this seems very improbable. 

But if Jehoiakim’s regnal years were counted from Tishri, the 

seventh month, his fourth year ended with Elul, the sixth month 

(corresponding to parts of August–September, 605 B.C.E.), and the 

fast in the ninth month (parts of November–December, 605 

B.C.E.) took place a little more than two months after the 

beginning of Jehoiakim’s fifth year. 

Baruch’s writing down of Jeremiah’s prophecies, then, took only 

a few months, which is more probable, and the fast could have 

been proclaimed only two months before it was held, and not long 

after the battle of Carchemish and the subsequent Babylonian 

operations in Syria and Palestine in the summer and autumn of 605 

B.C.E. 17 

4. There is evidence, too, that Jewish writers, when referring to 

foreign kings, at least sometimes reckoned their regnal years 

according to the Tishri year. This is done by Nehemiah for 

example. In Nehemiah 1:1 he refers to the month Chislev 

17 According to the Neo-Babylonian Chronicle 5 Nebuchadnezzar was enthroned in 

Babylon “on the first day of the month Elul,” corresponding to September 7, 605 

B.C.E., Julian calendar. After that, and still in his accession year, 

“Nebuchadnezzar returned to Hattu [the Syro-Palestinian area in the west]. Until 

the month Shebat [parts of January–February, 604 B.C.E.] he marched about 

victorious in Hattu.” — A. K. Grayson, Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles, (Locust 

Valley, New York: JJ. Augustin Publisher, 1975), p. 100. Thus Nebuchadnezzar 

may already have returned to the Hattu area at the time of the fast in November or 

December, 605 B.C.E. The danger of another invasion of Judah, therefore, seemed 

impending.


(November–December) in the twentieth year of Artaxerxes. But the 

month of Nisan of the next year is still referred to as in Artaxerxes’ 

twentieth year of rule. (Nehemiah 2:1) If Nehemiah reckoned 

Artaxerxes’ regnal years from Nisan 1, he should have written 

twenty-first year at chapter 2, verse 1. Nehemiah, therefore, obviously 

reckoned the regnal years of the Persian king Artaxerxes according 

to the Jewish Tishri-to-Tishri calendar, not according to the Persian 

Nisan-to-Nisan count. This is also supported in the Watch Tower 

Society’s Bible dictionary, Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 2 (1988), 

pages 487, 488. 18 

That Judah followed a Tishri-to-Tishri reckoning of the regnal 

years, at least in this period of its history, is the conclusion of some 

of the best scholars and students of Bible chronology, for example, 

Sigmund Mowinckel, Julian Morgenstein, Friedrich Karl Kienitz, 

Abraham Malamat, and Edwin R. Thiele. 19 Although this way of 

reckoning regnal years makes the synchronisms between Judah and 

Babylon somewhat more complicated, it clears up many problems 

when applied. In the chronological tables on pages 350–352 of this 

book, both kinds of regnal years are paralleled with our modern 

calendar. 

18 Few scholars seem to hold that Judah in the seventh and sixth centuries B.C.E. 

employed this combination of both the nonaccession year system and the Tishri-to- 

Tishri count of the regnal years, as advocated in this work. Those who opt for the 

nonaccession year system usually hold that Judah applied the Nisan-to-Nisan 

reckoning, and those who argue that Tishri-to-Tishri regnal years were used 

generally believe that the accession year system was employed. 

19 See for example J. Morgenstein’s review of Parker and Dubberstein’s Babylonian 

Chronology 626 B.C.–A.D. 45 in the Journal of Near Eastern Studies, Vol. 2 (1943), 

pp. 125–130, and Dr. A. Malamat’s article, “The Twilight of Judah: In the 

Egyptian-Babylonian Maelstrom,” in Supplements to Vetus Testamentum, Vol. 

XXVII (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1975), p. 124, including note 2; also K. S. Freedy and D. 

B. Redford, “The Dates in Ezekiel in Relation to Biblical, Babylonian and Egyptian 

Sources,” Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 90 (1970), pp. 464, 465. 

Dr. Edwin R. Thiele, however, assumes that while the books of Kings reckon the 

regnal years from Tishri, Jeremiah and Ezekiel both reckon them from Nisan. (E. 

R. Thiele, The Mysterious Numbers of the Hebrew Kings, Grand Rapids: Zondervan 

Publishing House, 1983, pp. 51–53, 182–191.) This seems a rather far-fetched 

speculation, and there is no need for it, if we allow for both Tishri regnal years and 

the nonaccession year system for this period.

Appendix 321 

For Chapter Three: 

SOME COMMENTS ON COPYING, READING, AND SCRIBAL 

ERRORS IN CUNEIFORM TABLETS 

If twenty years are to be added to the Neo-Babylonian era, 

considerable numbers of texts dated to each of these years should have 

been found. It would never do to come up with one or two oddly 

dated documents from the era. Like modern clerks, secretaries, and 

bookkeepers, the Babylonian scribes now and then made errors in 

writing. As the writing had to be done while the clay tablet was 

soft, some of the errors could be corrected before the tablet dried 

out. Many tablets bear traces of crossings-out and corrections. 

Usually, the errors found on the tablets concern minor details, 

repetitions, omissions, etc. Although the errors sometimes also 

concern the date, it is remarkable that most of the odd dates found 

in modern catalogues of Babylonian tablets turn out to be modern 

reading, copying, or printing errors, including misreading or 

misprinting of royal names. 

In their attempts at defending the Watch Tower Society’s 

chronology, some Witnesses, both in the United States and 

Norway, have exploited not only such copying, reading, and scribal 

errors in cuneiform texts, but also the dates on some documents 

that seem to create overlaps of a few weeks or months between the 

reigns of some of the Neo-Babylonian rulers. For this reason it 

seems necessary to take a closer look at these problems. 

Modern copying and reading errors 

As Mr. C. B. F. Walker at the British Museum points out, 

“modern readers frequently incorrectly read numbers and month 

names on Babylonian tablets.” 20 Royal names, too, are sometimes 

misread by modern scholars. Since dating within the Babylonian 

period is based on regnal years (rather than an era dating) the name 

of the king involved is obviously crucial. 

Thus on one published text the translation referred to 

Babylonian ruler “Labashi-Marduk’s 4th year. ”21 Later scholars 

20 Letter Walker-Jonsson, October 1, 1987. This is also reflected in the CBT 

catalogues on the Sippar collection at the British Museum, referred to in chapter 

3, note 60, which list some 40,000 texts. Quite a number of the odd dates are just 

printing errors, while many others on collation turn out to be reading errors. A list 

with corrections and additions is kept at the museum by Mr. Walker. 

21 R. Campbell Thompson, A Catalogue of the Late Babylonian Tablets in the Bodleian 

Library, Oxford IV (London: Luzac and Co., 1927), tablet no. A 83.


realized that the text actually referred to Assyrian king Shamashshum-ukin. 

22 (There is a wide difference in our alphabetical spelling of 

the two names, but one must remember these were written in 

cuneiform signs which, in this case, were much more easily 

mistakable.) A similar error in reading another tablet resulted in 

reference to the 21st year of Sin-shar-ishkun, the next to the last 

Assyrian king. 23 Later reexamination of this damaged section led to 

the conclusion the reference was more probably to Babylonian king 

Nabu-apla-usur (Nabopolassar). 24 

Scribal errors 

Not all the odd dates are modem errors, however. It is well 

established that the Persian king Cambyses, the son of Cyrus, ruled 

for eight years (529/28–522/21 B.C.E.). Yet one text from his 

reign (BM 30650) seemed to be dated to Cambyses’ “11th year”. At 

first the text caused much discussion among scholars, but it was 

finally concluded that it refers to Cambyses’ first year. The number 

“1” had been written over an original “10,” which the scribe had 

not been able to completely erase, resulting in a number that easily 

could be misread as “11”. 25 

Another document was dated to the “10th year” of Cyrus, 

although it is known from all ancient sources that Cyrus ruled for 

nine years only. The problem was soon resolved. In the period 

22 Letter Dr. D. J. Wiseman-Jonsson, June 19, 1987. 

23 G. Contenau in Textes Cuneiformes, Tome XII, Contrats Néo-Babyloniens, I (Paris: 

Librarie Orientaliste, 1927), p. 2 + P1. X, tablet no. 16; Archiv für Orientforschung, 

Vol. 16, 1952–53, p. 308; Journal of Cuneiform Studies, Vol. 35:1–2, 1983, p.59. 

24 Letter from Dr. Béatrice André of the Louvre Museum to C. O. Jonsson, March 20, 

1990. As Nabopolassar, the father of Nebuchadnezzar, ruled for 21 years, this 

reading of the royal name creates no problem. ― In the early days of Assyriology 

the reading of royal names was an even more arduous task. In 1877, for example, 

Wt. St. Chad Boscawen found two tablets in the archive of the Babylonian Egibi 

banking house, which seemed to mention two previously unknown Neo-Babylonian 

kings: Marduk-shar-uzur and La-khab-ba-si-kudur. Later, however, it turned out 

that the two names were misreadings for Nergal-shar-uzur [Neriglissar] and 

Labashi-Marduk. According to the banker Bosanquet, who financially supported 

Boscawen’s work on the tablets, there was also a tablet in the Egibi archive dated 

to the 11th year of Nergal-shar-uzur. However, no such tablet has since been 

found in the collection at the British Museum. It was most probably another 

misreading, and Bosanquet himself did not refer to it again when he later 

presented his own speculative and wholly untenable chronology of the Neo- 

Babylonian era.― Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archaeology, Vol.6 (London 

1878), pp. 11, 78, 92, 93, 108–111, 262, 263; S. M. Evers, “George Smith and the 

Egibi Tablets,” Iraq, Vol. LV, 1993, p. 110. 

25 F. H. Weissbach in Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft, Vol. 

LV, 1901, pp. 209, 210, with references.

Appendix 323 

involved, the scribes commonly made duplicate copies of an 

agreement, one for each party. Numbers of such duplicates have 

been found, including one for this text. But instead of being dated 

to the tenth year of Cyrus, this copy is dated to the “2nd year” of 

Cyrus. The first copy evidently contained a scribal error. 26 

The two above-mentioned examples are from the Persian era. 

What about the Neo-Babylonian period? 

A few documents from this era with unusual dates have been 

found that create some problems. It is remarkable, however, that 

the problems have to do with month numbers only, not with year 

numbers. Some defenders of Watch Tower chronology in their 

extreme efforts to find at least some support for their position have 

illogically sought to transform these overlaps of months into 

evidence for differences involving years. As the evidence will show, 

none of the documents can be used in a valid way to question the 


Overlap Nebuchadnezzar/Awel-Marduk? 

Two of the tablets containing problematic dates are from the 

accession-year of Awel-Marduk, the son and successor of 


The latest document from the reign of Nebuchadnezzar is dated 

VI/26/43 (month 6, day 26, year 43, corresponding to Oct. 8, 562 

B.C.E.). According to Parker & Dubberstein’s Babylonian 

Chronology, published in 1956, the first text from the reign of his son 

and successor, Awel-Marduk, is dated VI/26/acc. (month 6, day 

26, accession year), that is, on the same day. 27 

Since 1956, however, a couple of tablets from Sippar have been 

found that are dated to Awel-Marduk’s accession-year one month 

earlier, that is in the fifth month. On one tablet (BM 58872) the day 

number is damaged and illegible, but the other tablet (BM 75322) is 

26 Weissbach, ibid., p. 210. 

27 R. A. Parker and W. H. Dubberstein, Babylonian Chronology: 626 B.C.–AD. 75 

(Providence: Brown University Press, 1956), p. 12. 

28 A translation of the first text (BM 58872) was published by R. H. Sack in 1972 (no. 

79 in Ronald H. Sack, Amel-Marduk 562–560 B.C., Neukirchen-Vluyn: 

Neukirchener Verlag, 1972, pp. 3, 106). For the second text (BM 75322), see CBT 

(cf. p. 321, note 20), Vol. VIII, p.31. Two other texts published by Sack (numbered 

56 and 70 in his work) seem to be dated to the “4th month” of Awel-Marduk’s 

accession-year, which would imply an overlap of two months with the reign of his 

father. However, Mr. Walker, who collated the two texts in 1990, confirmed that 

no.56 (=BM 80920) is dated to the “7th month”, as shown also in CRT VIII, p.245. 

In Sack no. 70 (BM 65270), the month name is difficult to read, and “it is perhaps 

most likely that the month is 7 rather than 4” ―Letter Walker-Jonsson, November 

13, 1990. Cf. also D. J. Wiseman, Nebuchadrezzar and Babylon (Oxford: Oxford 

University Press, 1985), pp. 113, 114.


clearly dated V/20/acc. 28 These texts, then, indicate that there was 

an overlap of over one month between the reigns of the two kings: 

Nebuchadnezzar’s 43 nd year: last text: VI/26/43 

Months: | month 4 | month 5 | month 6 | month 7 | 

Awel-Marduk’s accession-year: first text: V/20/acc 

An explanation for this overlap maybe that Nebuchadnezzar 

died earlier than October (the sixth month of the Babylonian 

calendar year included part of October) and that some scribes 

continued to date documents to his reign for a few weeks until it 

was fully clear who his successor would be. Berossus states that his 

son and successor Awel-Marduk “managed the affairs in a lawless 

and outrageous fashion,” and therefore “was plotted against and 

killed by Neriglisaros [Neriglissar], his sister’s husband,” after only 

two years of reign. 29 As argued by the Polish Assyriologist Stefan 

Zawadzki, the wicked character of Awel-Marduk was probably 

evident already before his becoming king, which may have 

provoked opposition to his succession to the throne in some 

influential quarters. This may have been the reason why some 

scribes for a few weeks continued to date their documents to the 

reign of his deceased father. 30 (It has been pointed out earlier that 

Nabonidus evidently viewed Awel-Marduk as an usurper.) 

In order to add some years to the Neo-Babylonian period, 

someone might argue, as did one Norwegian source, that the dates 

above, rather than indicating an overlap, show that 

Nebuchadnezzar’s forty-third year was not the same as Awel- 

29 Stanley Mayer Burstein, The Babyloniaca of Berossus. Sources from the Ancient 

Near East, Vol. 1, fascicle 5 (Malibu, Calif.: Undena Publications, 1978), p. 28. 

30 Stefan Zawadzki, “Political Situation in Babylonia During Amel-Marduk’s Reign,” in 

J. Zablocka and S. Zawadzki (eds.), Shulmu IV: Everyday Life in Ancient Near East: 

Papers Presented at the International Conference, Poznan, 19–22 September, 1989 

(Poznan: Adam Mickiewicz University Press, 1993), pp. 309–317. That 

Nebuchadnezzar probably had died before the sixth month of the 43rd year is also 

supported by a Neo-Babylonian text from Uruk, YBC 4071, dated to the 15th of 

Abu (the fifth month), 43rd year of “The Lady of Uruk, King of Babylon” (the “Lady 

of Uruk” being Ishtar, the goddess of war and love, a great temple of whom was 

located in Uruk). Dr. David B. Weisberg, who published this text in 1980, 

concludes that Nebuchadnezzar evidently was dead at this time, although 

“cautious scribes continued to date to him even after his death, waiting prudently 

to see who his successor would be. One, however, may have tipped his hand and 

opted for a dating to The Lady-of-Uruk, ‘King’ of Babylon.” —D. B. Weisberg, Texts 

from the Time of Nebuchadnezzar, Yale Oriental Series, Vol. XVII (New Haven and 

London: Yale University Press, 1980), p. xix. Cf. Zawadzki, op. cit., p. 312.

Appendix 325 

Marduk’s accession-year, and that either Nebuchadnezzar ruled for 

more than forty-three years or there was another, unknown king 

between them. 

Such assumptions, however, are disproved by the Bible itself. A 

comparison of 2 Kings 24:12 and 2 Chronicles 36:10 with Jeremiah 

52:28 shows that Jehoiachin’s exile began toward the end of 

Nebuchadnezzar’s seventh regnal year. This would mean that at the 

death of Nebuchadnezzar in his forty-third year Jehoiachin had 

spent almost thirty-six years in exile (43-7=36), and that the thirtyseventh 

year of exile began later in that same year, in the accessionyear 

of Awel-Marduk (Evil-Merodach). And this is exactly what we 

are told in Jeremiah 52:31: 

But in the thirty-seventh year of the exile of Jehoiachin king of 

Judah, in the twelfth month, on the twenty-fifth day of the month, 

Evil-merodach king of Babylon, in the year he came to the throne, 

pardoned Jehoiachin king of Judah and released him from 

prison.—Jerusalem Bible. (Compare 2 Kings 25:27.) 

Clearly, the Bible does not allow for any additional years 

between the forty-third year of Nebuchadnezzar and the accessionyear 

of Awel-Marduk. 

Overlap Awel-Marduk/Neriglissar? 

Before the publication of the CBT catalogues in 1986–88 (see p. 

321, note 20), the latest tablet known from the reign of Awel- 

Marduk was dated V/17/2 (Aug. 7, 560 B.C.E.), while the first tablet 

from the reign of his successor Neriglissar was dated V/21/acc. 

(Aug. 11, 560 B.C.E.). Only four days, then, separated the latest 

tablet from Awel-Marduk’s reign from the first tablet dated to 

Neriglissar. 31 

In the CBT catalogues, however, there are two texts that seem 

to create a considerable overlap between the reigns of Awel- 

Marduk and Neriglissar. The first (BM 61325) is from the reign of 

Awel-Marduk and is dated to the tenth month of his second regnal 

year (X/19/2), or about five months later than the latest tablet 

previously known from his reign. 32 

This overlap of five months with the reign of Neriglissar is 

further extended by the second text, BM 75489, which is dated to 

31 Ronald H. Sack, “Nergal-sharra-usur, King of Babylon as seen in the Cuneiform, 

Greek, Latin and Hebrew Sources ,” Zeitschrift für Assyriologie, Vol. 68 (Berlin, 

1978), p. 132. 

32 CBT VII, p.36. The catalogue has day “17”, which is corrected to “19” in Walker’s 

list.


the second month of Neriglissar’s accession-year (II/4/acc.), or 

about three months and a half earlier than the earliest tablet previously 

known from his reign. 33 Together, these two texts seem to create 

an overlap of eight and a half months: 

Awel-Marduk’s 2nd year: 

last text: X/19/2 

Months: | month 1 | month 2 | months 3–9 | month 10 | 

Neriglissar’s accession-year: first text: II/4/acc 

How can this overlap be explained? Again, someone might 

argue that the dates above, rather than showing an overlap, indicate 

that Awel-Marduk’s second year was not the same as Neriglissar’s 

accession-year, and that either he ruled for more than two years or 

that there was another, unknown ruler between the two. 

Any evidence, however, in support of such assumptions is 

completely lacking. It should be kept in mind that each of their 

known regnal years are covered by numerous dated tablets, both 

published and unpublished. If Awel-Marduk ruled for more than 

two years, we would have a large number of tablets, economic and 

other types, dated to each of those additional years. 

It is of considerable interest in this connection that the Uruk 

King List (discussed in chapter 3, section B-1b) specifies the reign 

of Neriglissar as “‘3’ (years) 8 months”. As Neriglissar’s reign 

ended in the first month (Nisanu) of his fourth year (see below), he 

acceded to the throne in the fifth month (Abu) three years and 

eight months earlier, according to this kinglist. This is the same month 

as that established earlier for his accession, before the two odd dates mentioned 

above were discovered. 

There are good reasons to believe that the information given in 

the Uruk King List was based upon sources that go back to the 

Neo-Babylonian period itself, including the chronicles. The 

preserved figures are all in good agreement with those established 

by the contemporary documents. This seems to be true even 

when—in two cases―the number of months is given. 

Thus the Uruk King List gives Labashi-Marduk a reign of only 

three months, and the contracts from Uruk dated to his reign also 

show that he was recognized in that city as king for (parts of) three 

33 CBT VIII, p. 35. Walker, who collated both tablets on several occasions, points out 

that “the months are very clearly written in both cases.” — Letter Walker-Jonsson, 

October 26, 1990.

Appendix 327 

months. When the same kinglist, therefore, indicates that 

Neriglissar acceded to the throne in the month of Abu, this, too, 

may very well be correct. At this point of time he had firmly 

established his rule and was recognized as king in most parts of 

Babylonia. 34 

If the two odd dates referred to earlier are not simply scribal 

errors, the reason for the overlap they create at the end of Awel- 

Marduk’s reign may be the same as that suggested above for the 

overlap at the beginning of his reign, namely, the prevailing 

opposition against his rule, which culminated with Neriglissar’s 

seizure of power through a coup d’état. This explanation has recently 

been argued in some detail by R. H. Sack in his book Neriglissar- 

King of Babylon. 35 

Overlap Neriglissar/Labashi-Marduk? 

The two last tablets known from the reign of Neriglissar are 

dated 1/2/4 (April 12, 556 B.C.E.) and I?/6/4 (April 16). The first 

tablet known from the reign of his son and successor, Labashi- 

Marduk, is dated I/23/acc. (May 3, 556 B.C.E.), that is, twentyone, 

or possibly only seventeen days later. These dates create no 

overlap between the two. 

Overlap Labashi-Marduk/Nabonidus? 

The latest tablet known from the reign of Labashi-Marduk is 

dated III/12/acc. (June 20, 556 B.CE.), while the first tablet known 

from the reign of his successor, Nabonidus, is dated one month 

earlier, II/15/acc. (May 25, 556 B.CE.). This overlap of somewhat 

less than a month is a real one. 

It may be easily accounted for, however, by the circumstances that 

brought Nabonidus to the throne. As explained by Berossus, 

Labashi-Marduk was “only a child” at the time of Neriglissar’s 

death. 

34 Documents from Uruk show that Labashi-Marduk was recognized as king in that 

city in the months of Nisanu, Ayyaru, and Simanu.— Paul-Alain Beaulieu, The 

Reign of Nabonidus, King of Babylon 556–539 B.C. (New Haven and London: Yale 

University Press, 1989), pp. 86–88. The critical comments on the Uruk King List by 

Ronald H. Sack on page 3 of his work, Neriglissar―King of Babylon (= Alter Orient 

and Altes Testament, Band 236, Neukirchen-vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1994), 

are mistaken, as they are based on an inadequate presentation of the list, which 

also disagrees with the sources referred to in his footnote. 

35 R. H. Sack, op. cit., pp. 25–31. There is some evidence that Neriglissar, before his 

seizure of power, held the highest office (qipu) at the Ebabbara temple in Sippar, 

and that his revolt started in that city. This would explain why the earliest texts 

dated to his reign are from Sippar, indicating he was first recognized in that area 

while Awel-Marduk was still recognized elsewhere for several months.—S. 

Zawadzki, op. cit. (note 30 above), also J. MacGinnis in Journal of the American 

Oriental Society, Vol. 120:I (2000), p. 64.


“Because his wickedness became apparent in many ways he was 

plotted against and brutally killed by his friends. After he had been 

killed, the plotters met and jointly conferred the kingdom on 

Nabonnedus [Nabonidus], a Babylonian and a member of the 

conspiracy:” 36 This account agrees with the Hillah-stele, where 

Nabonidus gives a similar description of Labashi-Marduk’s 

character and of his own enthronement. 37 

The evidence is that the rebellion that brought Nabonidus to 

power broke out almost immediately after Labashi-Marduk’s 

accession, and that both of them ruled simultaneously for a few 

weeks, but at different places. It should be noted that all tablets known 

from the reign of Labashi-Marduk are from three cities only, 

Babylon, Uruk, and Sippar, and that there was no overlap between 

the two reigns at any of these cities: 

Nippur Babylon Uruk Sippar 

Labashi-Marduk, latest tablet: — May 24 June 19 June 20 

Nabonidus, earliest tablet: May 25 July 14? July 1 June 26 

Dr. Paul-Alain Beaulieu discusses the available data at some 

length, concluding that, “In consideration of all this evidence the 

usual reconstruction of Nabonidus’ accession seems correct. He 

was probably recognized as king as early as May 25 in central 

Babylonia (Babylon and Nippur), but outlaying regions would have 

recognized Labâshi-Marduk until the end of June.” 38 

Thus, there is a well-founded explanation for the brief overlap 

between the reigns of Labashi-Marduk and Nabonidus. The 

accession of the young and—at least in some influential circles— 

unpopular Labashi-Marduk caused a rebellion and Nabonidus, 

strongly supported by leading strata in Babylonia, seized power and 

established a rival kingship. For a brief period there was a double 

kingship, although in different parts of the kingdom, until Labashi- 

Marduk finally was murdered and Nabonidus could be officially 

crowned as king. 

In conclusion, the odd dates on a few tablets from the Neo- 

Babylonian period create no major problems. None of them add 

any years to the period, as the “overlaps” created by the odd dates 

36 Burstein, op. cit., p. 28. 

37 Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament [ANET], ed. by James B. 

Pritchard (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1950), p. 309. For 

additional details, see chapter 3 above, section B-4-e. 

38 Paul-Alain Beaulieu, op. cit. (note 34 above), pp. 86–88. Cf. also W. Röllig in 

Reallexikon der Assyriologie and vorderasiatischen Archäologie, ed. D. G. Edzard, 

Vol. VI (Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1980), p. 409.

Appendix 329 

concern months only, not years. And as has been shown above, it is 

possible to find reasonable explanations for all the three overlaps 

without giving oneself up to farfetched and demonstrably 

untenable theories about extra years and extra kings during the 

period. 39 

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS ON THE ROYAL INSCRIPTIONS 

The Hillah stele (Nabon. No. 8) 

According to the Hillah stele, fifty-four years had passed from the 

desolation of the temple Éhulhul in Harran in the six,teenth year of 

Nabopolassar (610/609 B.C.E.) until the accession-year of 

Nabonidus (556/555 B.C.E.). 

In an attempt to undermine the confidence in the information 

on this stele, at least one of the defenders of the Watch Tower 

Society’s chronology has claimed that the fifty-four years referred 

to the period of desolation of the Éhulhul temple, and that 

Nabonidus states it was rebuilt immediately after the end of this 

period. As the rebuilding of the temple was not actually completed 

until several years after the Hillah stele had been inscribed, the 

fifty-four year period is claimed to be a fiction. 

Such an interpretation of the stele is a gross distortion of the 

matter. Although it is true that the temple had lain desolate for 

fifty-four years when Nabonidus, in his accession-year, concluded 

that the gods had commanded him to rebuild it, he does not say 

39 If defenders of the Watch Tower Society’s chronology insist that such an “overlap” 

of some months between two Neo-Babylonian rulers indicates there were more 

years or maybe even an extra king between the two, they should—for the sake of 

consistence—give the same explanation to similar “overlaps” found between rulers 

of the Persian era. For example, the latest tablet from the reign of Cyrus is dated 

VIII/20/9 (December 5, 530 B.C.E.), while the earliest text from the reign of his 

successor, Cambyses, is dated VI/12/acc. (August 31, 530 B.C.E.). This would 

mean there was an overlap between the two rulers of over three months! (Jerome 

Peat, “Cyrus ‘king of lands,’ Cambyses ‘king of Babylon’: the disputed co-regency,” 

Journal of Cuneiform Studies, Vol. 41/2, Autumn 1989, p. 210; M. A. Dandamayev, 

Iranians in Achaemenid Babylonia, Cosa Mesa, Califomia and New York: Mazda 

Publishers, 1992, pp. 92, 93.) As the Watch Tower Society dates the fall of Babylon 

to 539 B.C.E. by counting backwards from the reign of Cambyses, they would 

certainly not like to have any additional years inserted between Cyrus and 

Cambyses, as that would move the date for the fall of Babylon as many years 

backwards in time! (See Insight an the Scriptures, Vol. 1, 1988, p. 453.) 

Dandamayev (op. cit., 1992, p.93) gives the following very plausible explanation of 

the overlap: “It seems that Cyrus appointed Cambyses as joint ruler before his 

expedition against the Massagetae” This is in agreement with Herodotus’ statement 

(VII, 3) that it was the custom of Persian kings to appoint their successors to the 

throne before they went out to war, in case they would be killed in the battles.


that it was rebuilt immediately. As indicated by a number of texts the 

restoration of the temple was evidently a drawn-out process that 

lasted for several years, perhaps until the thirteenth year of 

Nabonidus. 

The fifty-four years, on the other hand, clearly ended in the 

accession-year of Nabonidus, when, according to the Adad-guppi’ 

inscription, “the wrath of his [Sin’s] heart calmed. Towards E-hulhul 

the temple of Sin which (is) in Harran, the abode of his heart’s 

delight, he was reconciled, he had regard. Sin, king of the gods, 

looked upon me and Nabu-na’id (my) only son, the issue of my 

womb, to the kingship he called. “ 40 

The statement on the Hillah stele that Sin at this time “returned 

to his place” should not be taken to mean that the temple was 

rebuilt at this time. Rather, it may mean that Sin, the moon god, 

“returned to his place” in the sky, as suggested by Tadmor. The 

Babylonians not only knew that lunar phenomena such as eclipses 

often recurred after a period of eighteen years (the so-called “Saros 

cycle”), but that they also, and with a much higher degree of 

reliability, recurred after a period of fifty-four years (three “Saros 

cycles”). The Babylonian astronomers even used these and other 

cycles for predicting lunar eclipses. At the time Nabonidus acceded 

to the throne a complete cycle of the moon had passed since the 

destruction of the moon temple at Harran, and Nabonidus may 

have seen this as a remarkable coincidence and a favorable omen. 

As Sin had now “returned to his place” in the sky, had not the time 

arrived for him to return also to his earthly abode in Harran? So 

Nabonidus concluded that the temple had to be rebuilt. 41 

The Adad-guppi’ inscription (Nabon. No. 24) 

It is well known that the Adad-guppi’ inscription at one point 

contains an error of calculation. As defenders of the Watch Tower 

Society’s chronology have emphasized this error in an attempt to 

undermine the value of the inscription, a few comments on the 

problem seem necessary. 

40 C. J. Gadd, “The Hamat Inscriptions of Nabonidus,” Anatolian Studies, Vol. VIII, 

1958, pp. 47–49. 

41 Hayim Tadmor, “The Inscriptions of Nabunaid: Historical Arrangement,” in Studies 

in Honor of Benno Landsberger on his Seventy-fifth Birthday [Assyriological Studies, 

No. 16], ed. H. Güterbock & T. Jacobsen (Chicago: The Chicago University Press, 

1965), p. 355.—For the superiority of the 54-year cycle, see Dr. W. Hartner, 

“Eclipse Periods and Thales’ Prediction of a Solar Eclipse. Historical Truth and 

Modern Myth,” in Centaurus, Vol. 14, 1969, pp. 60–71.

Appendix 331 

Ashurbanipal is generally believed to have begun his reign in 

Assyria in 668 B.C.E. His twentieth year, therefore, is dated to 

649/48 B.C.E. If Adad-guppi’ was born in that year, and if she 

lived on until the beginning of Nabonidus’ ninth year, 547 B.C.E., 

she would have been 101 or 102 years old at her death, not 104 

years as stated in the inscription. Scholars who have examined the 

inscription, therefore, have concluded that the stele contains a 

miscount of about two years. “All agree on this point,” say scholars 

P. Garelli and V. Nikiprowetsky. 42 

Further, the inscription seems to give the Assyrian king Assuretil-ili 

a reign of three years, which has been regarded as a problem 

as there is a contract tablet dated to the fourth year of this king. 43 

Since C. J. Gadd published his translation of the text, other 

scholars have examined these problems. Dr. Joan Oates offers a 

solution which has been accepted by other scholars as most 

probably the correct one: 44 

As is evident from the inscription, Adad-guppi’ first lived in 

Assyrian territory (perhaps in Harran) serving under Assyrian kings 

until the third year of Assur-etil-ili, when she moved to Babylon, 

serving under Babylonian kings from that time on. As Oates 

explains, this does not mean that Assur-etil-ili’s third year was his 

last. If Assur-etil-ili began his rule in Assyria after his father’s death 

in 627 B.C.E., his third year was 624/23 B.C.E. His second and 

third regnal years in Assyria, then, overlapped the first and second 

years of Nabopolassar in Babylon (625/24 and 624/23 B.C.E.). In 

calculating the age of Adad-guppi’, Nabonidus (or the scribe who 

made the inscription) simply summed up the regnal years without 

taking into account this overlapping of Assur-etil-ili’s reign with 

that of Nabopolassar. 45 

Oates’ solution was supported in 1983 by Erle Leichty. 

Discussing a new inscription from Assur-etil-ili’s reign, he pointed 

out its agreement with Oates’ conclusion that “the third year of 

Assur-etilli-ilani is the same as the second year of Nabopolassar,” 

42 P. Garelli and V. Nikiprowetsky, Le Proche-Orient Asiatique (Paris: Presses 

Universitaires de France, 1974), p. 241. One exception is M. Gerber in ZA 88:1 

(1998), pp. 72–93. 

43 C. J. Gadd, op. cit., pp. 70ff. 

44 Joan Oates, “Assyrian Chronology, 631–612 B.C.,” Iraq, Vol. 27, 1965, pp. 135– 

159. 

45 Evidently Dr. Paul-Alain Beaulieu, in his discussion of these problems, was not 

aware of Oates’ solution. His comments, therefore, are confusing, and his 

questioning of the accuracy of the chronological data of the stele clearly is 

unwarranted.—Paul-Alain Beaulieu, The Reign of Nabonidus, King of Babylon 556– 

539 B.C. (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1989), pp. 139, 140.


adding, “I believe that the Oates chronology will probably turn out 

to be the correct one, but final judgement must await the rest of 

the evidence.” 46 

Whatever the case, the error in the inscription is a minor 

problem that does not affect the reigns of the Neo-Babylonian kings 

as given in the Adad-guppi’ inscription. It arose in the attempt to 

establish Adad-guppi’s age, which had to be calculated, because, as 

pointed out by Rykle Borger, the Babylonians (like Jehovah’s 

Witnesses today!) “never celebrated their birthdays, and hardly 

knew how old they were themselves:” 47 

For Chapter Four: 

1. ASTROLOGY AS A MOTIVE FOR BABYLONIAN 

ASTRONOMY 

In order to depreciate the value of the astronomical texts, some 

defenders of the Watch Tower chronology have emphasized that 

the Babylonians’ interest in the celestial phenomena was astrologically 

motivated. Although it is true that this was an important object of 

their study of the sky, it actually contributed to the exactness of the 

observations. 

In the great collection of ancient omens called Enuma Anu Enlil 

(the final form of which dates from the Neo-Assyrian period) the 

observer is given this instruction: 

When the Moon is eclipsed you shall observe exactly month, day, 

night-watch, wind, course, and position of the stars in whose realm the eclipse 

takes place. The omens relative to its month, its day, its night-watch, 

its wind, its course, and its stars you shall indicate. 

For the Babylonian “astrologers” eclipses played the most 

prominent role, and all details, therefore, were highly important. 

Dr. A. Pannekoek concludes that “the astrological motive, by 

demanding greater attention in observing the moon, provided for 

better foundations in chronology. 48 

Further, it would be a mistake to think that “astrology” in the 

sense this word is used today was practiced in the Neo-Babylonian 

period or earlier. The idea that a man’s fate is determined by the 

positions of the stars and planets at the date of birth or conception 

originated much later, during the Persian era. The oldest horoscope 

discovered dates to 410 B.C.E. 49 As pointed out by B. L. van der 

46 Erie Leichty in the Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 103, 1983, p.220, 

note 2. 

47 Rykle Borger, “Mespotamien in den Jahren 629–621 v. Chr.,” Wiener Zeitschrift für 

die Kunde des Morgenlandes, Vol. 55, 1959, p. 73. 

48 A. Pannekoek, A History of Astronomy (London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1961), 

pp. 43, 44. 

49 A. J. Sachs, ‘Babylonian horoscopes,” Journal of Cuneiform Studies, Vol. 6(1952), p. 

49.

Appendix 333 

Waerden, the earlier astrology “had a quite different character: it 

aimed at short-range predictions of general public events, such as wars and 

harvests, from striking phenomena such as eclipses, clouds, annual 

rising and setting of planets, whereas the [later] Hellenistic 

‘Chaldeans’ predicted individual fates from positions of planets and 

zodiacal signs at the date of birth or conception.” 50 

Professor Otto Neugebauer, therefore, explains that 

“Mesopotamian ‘astrology’ can be much better compared with 

weather prediction from phenomena observed in the skies than 

with astrology in the modern sense of the word.” He also 

emphasizes that the origin of astronomy was not astrology but 

calendaric problems: “Determination of the season, measurement 

of time, lunar festivals―these are the problems which shaped 

astronomical development for many centuries,” and “even the last 

phase of Mesopotamian astronomy . . . was mainly devoted to 

problems of the lunar calendar.” 51 

2. SOME COMMENTS ON ANCIENT LUNAR ECLIPSES 

How reliable are modern identifications of lunar eclipses described 

in ancient Babylonian astronomical texts from the eighth century 

B.C.E. onward? Pointing out one of the pitfalls, the Watch Tower 

Society quotes The Encyclopaedia Britannica as saying that a particular 

town or city would, on the average, experience about forty lunar 

eclipses in fifty years. 52 Although this is true, the frequency of 

eclipses falling in a specific month is much lower. Other factors, 

too, set limits to the alternatives. 

Even when a lunar eclipse recurs in the same month one year 

later, it will not occur at exactly the same time of the day or be of the 

same magnitude. If it occurs during the daylight hours it will, of 

course, be invisible from that part of the earth. As the Babylonian 

astronomers often give specific data on lunar eclipses, such as date 

(regnal year, month, day), 53 time of the onset relative to sunrise or 

50 B. L. van der Waerden, “History of the Zodiak,” Archiv für Orientforschung, Vol. 16 

(1952/53), p. 224. 

51 Otto Neugebauer, Astronomy and History. Selected Essays (New York: Springer- 

Verlag, 1983), p. 55.—For an extensive discussion of the nature of Babylonian 

astrology, see Francesca Rochberg-Halton, Aspects of Babylonian Celestial 

Divination: The Lunar Eclipse Tablets of Enuma Anu Enlil (= Archiv für 

Orientforschung, Beiheft 22), (Horn, Austria: Verlag Ferdinand Berger & Söhne 

Gesellschaft M.B.H., 1988), pp. 2–17. 

52 1nsight on the Scriptures, Vol. 1, p. 454. 

53 The day number is often omitted in the texts, because, as each Babylonian month 

began at new moon, the full moon and therefore also any possible lunar eclipse 

always fell in or near to the middle of the month.


sunset, duration of partial and total phases, sometimes also 

magnitude and position relative to stars or constellations, the 

identification of the eclipses described in such texts usually creates 

no problems, provided that the texts are well preserved. 

The Watchtower of March 15, 1969, pages 184 onward, refers to 

another factor, which, it is held, makes it difficult to identify 

ancient eclipses. It is pointed out that astronomers for a long time 

(for centuries, actually) have been aware of the fact that the tides 

produced by the moon and the sun in the oceans and body of the 

earth create a retardation of the earth’s rotation, causing a gradual 

lengthening of the day. This, it is said in the article, affects the 

ancient records. 

However, when it comes to identifying ancient lunar eclipses 

from the eighth century B.C.E. onward, this is not a major problem 

today. The great number of observations recorded on cuneiform 

tablets have, in fact, enabled modern astronomers to measure the 

exact rate of this change of the earth’s rotation. It is known today 

that the length of the day increases at a rate of 1.7 milliseconds per 

century. The day in Late Babylonian time was thus about 43–44 

milliseconds shorter than present. 54 

Today astronomers, of course, make allowance for the variation 

in the earth’s rotation in their calculations of the dates of ancient 

eclipses. The Watchtower article discussed solar eclipses only. But as 

very few reliable observations of solar eclipses are preserved from 

ancient times, and as none of them are connected with the 

chronology of the Neo-Babylonian period, they are irrelevant to 

our discussion. 

As I wanted to know how ancient records of lunar eclipses are 

affected by this increasing of the solar day, I wrote to Professor 

Robert R. Newton, who at that time (in 1981) was a leading 

authority on this problem. 55 I wanted to know how much the 

lengthening of the solar day has affected ancient records of lunar 

eclipses and if we can still rely upon the older tables of calculations 

of lunar eclipses published by Oppolzer in 1887 and Ginzel in 

1899. 

54 This most recent value is the result of the very careful research performed by 

Richard Stephenson of the University of Durham and Leslie Morrison, formerly of 

the Royal Greenwich Observatory in Cambridge.—See New Scientist, January 30, 

1999, pp. 30–33. 

55 Newton’s research in this area has since been improved upon by other scholars. 

See, now, the exhaustive discussion by F. Richard Stephenson in Historical 

Eclipses and Earth’s Rotation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997).

Newton, in his answer said: 

Appendix 335 

I have not used Ginzel’s canon much, and cannot speak 

specifically of the errors in it. However, I expect that his errors are 

about the same as those in Oppolzer’s Canon der Finsternisse, which 

I have used extensively. The earliest lunar eclipse in his canon, for 

example, is that of —1206, April 21, which came at 20H 17M, 

Greenwich Mean Time, with a magnitude of 2.6 digits, according 

to his calculations. According to my calculations, it came on that 

date at 20H 32M, with a magnitude of 2.4 digits. Thus it is perfectly 

safe to use Oppolzer’s Canon in identifying ancient eclipses; his greatest errors 

are probably something like half an hour. 56 

As far as lunar eclipses are concerned, then, the argument that 

the lengthening of the solar day caused by tides makes it difficult to 

identify ancient eclipses is not valid. In modern eclipse catalogues, 

of course, the errors in the canons of Oppolzer and Ginzel have 

been corrected. 57 

For Chapter Five: 

THE “THIRD YEAR OF JEHOIAKIM” (DANIEL 1:1, 2) 

Daniel 1:1f. dates the first deportation of Jewish prisoners by 

Nebuchadnezzar to the “third year of the reign of Jehoiakim. “ As 

was shown in the appendix for chapter two (”Methods of 

reckoning regnal years”), in this passage Daniel seems to follow the 

Babylonian method of counting regnal years, employing an 

accession year even for kings outside Babylon, including Jehoiakim. 

This makes Jehoiakim’s fourth year (Jeremiah 46:2) his third year in 

the accession-year system, and this third year of Jehoiakim in turn 

corresponds to Nebuchadnezzar’s accession year. 

Thus it is seen that this first deportation took place in the same 

year as the famous battle at Carchemish, and evidently shortly after 

that battle, in the year 605 B.C.E. Daniel 1:1f., therefore, strongly 

56 Letter Newton—Jonsson, dated May 11, 1981. Other scholars agree. Jean Meeus & 

Hermann Mucke, for example, in their Canon of Lunar Eclipses — 2002 to + 2526 

(Wien: Astronomisches Büro, 1979), page XII, explain that Oppolzer’s monumental 

work “is accurate enough for historical research.” This, of course, refers to ancient 

lunar eclipses, not ancient solar eclipses, on which the Canon is far from correct. 

See, for instance, the comments by Willy Hartner in Centaurus, Vol. 14 (1969), p. 

65. 

57 See, for example, Bao-Lin Liu and Alan D. Fiala, Canon of Lunar Eclipses 1500 

B.C.–AD. 3000 (Richmond, Virginia: Willman-Bell, Inc., 1992).


supports the conclusion that Judah became a vassal to Babylon 

eighteen years before the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 B.C.E., in 

confirmation of the conclusion that the seventy years (Jeremiah 

25:11; 29:10) should be understood as a period of servitude, not of 

desolation. 

Reinterpretations of the “third year of Jehoiakim” 

In order to undermine the strength of Daniel 1:1 several arguments 

have been advanced in the publications of the Watch Tower 

Society against a natural reading of this text. As early as 1896 

Pastor Charles T. Russell, in writing in Zion’s Watch Tower of May 

15, page 106 (Reprints, pp. 1975–76) argued against those who 

quoted Daniel 1:1 in support of the secular dates for 

Nebuchadnezzar’s reign: 

For instance, they adopt the uncertain secular date for the 

beginning of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign; and then referring to Dan. 

1:1, they thus fix the date of Jehoiakim’s reign and alter other 

matters to suit. Then again, they apply the “seventy years” as years 

of captivity and begin them in the third year of Jehoiakim; whereas 

the Scriptures unequivocally declare, repeatedly, that those were 

years of “desolation of the land,” “without an inhabitant.” (Jer. 

25:11, 12; 29:10; 2 Chron. 36:21; Dan. 9:2.) 

Several years later two prominent members of Russell’s 

movement, the Scottish brothers John and Morton Edgar, 

published the two-volume Great Pyramid Passages. 58 On page 31 of 

Volume II, they summarize their arguments against a natural 

reading of Daniel 1:1: 

[1] It cannot be admitted that the 70 years desolation of 

Jerusalem and the land began in the 3rd year of Jehoiakim, for 

according to the Scriptures “desolation” implies “without an 

inhabitant,” and Jerusalem and the land were not without 

inhabitants until after the dethronement of Zedekiah. . . . 

[2] [A natural reading of Daniel 1:1] conflicts with Daniel 2:1. In 

reading over the 1st chapter of Daniel it would appear that the 

Hebrew children were taken captive by Nebuchadnezzar in the 3rd 

year of Jehoiakim. They were trained in the learning and tongue of 

the Chaldeans for three years (verses 4, 5), and yet, according to 

Dan. 2:1,25, they were brought into the presence of 

58 John and Morton Edgar, Great Pyramid Passages (London: The Marshall Press, 

Ltd., 1923–24). The first edition was published in 1912 and 1913 and was 

distributed by the Watch Tower Society. It was reissued with some additions in 

1923 and 1924 by Morton Edgar, who also added a Vol. III. (His brother John 

Edgar died in 1910.) The quotations here are from the 1924 edition of Vol. II.

Appendix 337 

Nebuchadnezzar in or before his second year, though verse 18 of 

the 1st chapter shows that the three years had completely expired. 

How, then, is Daniel 1:1 to be understood? The Edgar brothers 

pointed out that “a number of commentators suggest that the 3rd 

year of Jehoiakim in Daniel 1:1 should be understood as meaning 

the 3rd year of his vassalage to Nebuchadnezzar,” which in effect 

was his eleventh and last regnal year. 59 In this way the deportation 

of Daniel and other Hebrew captives was made identical with the 

deportation of Jehoiachin in the seventh year of Nebuchadnezzar. 

But this explanation did not negate the seeming conflict with 

Daniel 2:1, which dates the image dream of Nebuchadnezzar to his 

second year; in fact, that conflict was exacerbated. If Daniel was 

not deported to Babylon until the seventh year of Nebuchadnezzar, 

how could he be at his court interpreting his dreams in his second 

year, five years earlier? 

So, in addition to the interpretation placed on Daniel 1:1 to 

explain its reference to the third year of Jehoiakim, there was also 

need for another interpretation of Daniel 2:1 to explain its 

reference to Nebuchadnezzar’s second year. The Edgar brothers 

suggested that the number “2” is an error, which “has evidently 

risen out of the number 12.” 60 Later these arguments were adopted 

by the Watch Tower Society. They were, for example, incorporated 

into the 1922 edition of the booklet The Bible on Our Lord’s Return, 

pages 84–88. 

But the explanation that Daniel 1:1 refers to Jehoiakim’s third 

year of vassalage to Nebuchadnezzar, corresponding to 

Nebuchadnezzar’s seventh regnal year, creates yet another 

problem. 

If this vassalage ended in the seventh year of Nebuchadnezzar, it 

must have begun three years earlier according to 2 Kings 24:1, or in 

Nebuchadnezzar’s fourth year, which was the eighth year of 

Jehoiakim. As is stated in 2 Kings 23:34–37, Jehoiakim was a 

tributary king of Egypt before he became a vassal to Babylon. If we 

59 Ibid., Vol. II, pp. 29 (ftn. 4) and 31. This “solution,” found already in Josephus’ Ant. 

X, 6:1–3, was adopted by a number of later writers. Dr. E. W. Hengstenberg refers 

to it in his work Die Authentie des Daniel und die Integrität des Sacharjah 

(Berlin,1831), p.54. Hengstenberg rejects the idea because (1) there is no evidence 

indicating that Jehoiakim’s regnal years were counted in this curious way, (2) it is 

an unfounded hypothesis with no support in the Bible, or elsewhere, that 

Nebuchadnezzar’s first siege of Jerusalem occurred in Jehoiakim’s eighth year, 

and (3) the “solution” is in inextricable conflict with Daniel 2:1. 

60 John and Morton Edgar, op. cit., Vol. II, p. 32. This, too, is an old idea, suggested, 

for example, by Chrysostom in the fourth century. One ancient manuscript of the 

LXX version of Daniel (Papyrus 967), dating from the early third century CE., also 

reads “twelfth” at Dan. 2:1. The reading is best explained as a scribal 

“correction”.—John J. Collins, Daniel (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993), p. 154.


accept the Watch Tower explanation, this would mean that his 

vassalage to Egypt continued up to his eighth year. Yet both 

Jeremiah 46:2 and the Babylonian chronicle B.M. 21946 indicate 

that Jehoiakim’s vassalage changed from Egypt to Babylon in the 

same year as the battle of Carchemish, or in the fourth year of 

Jehoiakim. 

In the book Equipped for Every Good Work, published by the 

Watch Tower Society in 1946, the arguments against a natural 

reading of Daniel 1:1 are repeated on pages 225–227. But 

interestingly, the Egyptian vassalage is now discussed: 

Jehoiakim was put on the throne by Egyptian decree and was 

tributary to Egypt for several years, but when Babylon defeated Egypt 

Jehoiakim came under Babylonian control and so remained for three years, 

after which three-year period as tributary to Babylon the Judean 

king rebelled. 61 

Here it is admitted that Jehoiakim’s vassalage changed from 

Egypt to Babylon when Babylon defeated Egypt. The real problem, 

however, is concealed, as it is not mentioned that Egypt was 

defeated in the fourth year of Jehoiakim (Jeremiah 46:2), and not in 

his eighth year as the Watch Tower explanation would require! 

Another interesting change may also be noted in Equipped for 

Every Good Work. Instead of holding to the earlier guess that the 

“second year” in Daniel 2:1 originally read “twelfth year,” the 

following interpretation is presented: 

The time of this dream and its interpretation is stated as the 

second year of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign. . . . In the nineteenth year 

of his reign Nebuchadnezzar was used as God’s executioner to 

destroy faithless Jerusalem and end Israel’s history as an 

independent Theocratic nation. Then Nebuchadnezzar began 

reigning in a unique way, as the first of the world rulers of the 

Gentile times. In the second year of his reign in this special capacity 

the dream showing the end of Satan’s organization and rule and 

the taking over of power by Christ’s kingdom came to 

Nebuchadnezzar, as recorded at chapter 2. 62 

According to this explanation, the “second year” of Daniel 2:1, 

or the second year of the Gentile times, reckoned from 607 B.C.E., 

was actually Nebuchadnezzar’s twentieth regnal year! Why would 

61 Equipped for Every Good Work (Brooklyn, N.Y.: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 

1946), pp. 225–226. 

62 Ibid., pp. 226–227. This, too, was an earlier idea, suggested already in the Jewish 

Talmud (Seder ‘Olam Rabbah; see John J. Collins, op. cit., p. 154). Hengstenberg 

(op. cit., p. 54) rejects it because there is “not the slightest trace” of any such 

reckoning of Nebuchadnezzar’s regnal years anywhere.

Appendix 339 

Daniel use this curious way of reckoning regnal years only in this 

passage of his book? No other arguments are proposed for this 

new position except this statement: 

Here again, as at Daniel 1:1, the peculiarity which the writer of 

this book has of making a secondary reckoning of the years of a 

king’s reign is demonstrated. He reckons by counting from 

epochal events within the reign that put the king in a new 

relationship. 63 

There could hardly be a more obvious example of circular 

reasoning. 

The date of Jehoiakim’s rebellion 

The latest discussion of these problems is found in the Watch 

Tower Society’s Bible dictionary Insight on the Scriptures, Vol. 1 

(1988), pages 1268–69. Daniel 1:1 is still interpreted as meaning the 

third year of Jehoiakim’s vassalage to Babylon, beginning at the end 

of his eighth year of reign and ending in his eleventh and last year. 

On page 480 of Vol. 2 of the same work, an attempt is made to 

find support for this in the Babylonian chronicle B.M. 21946. After 

recording the battle of Carchemish in Nebuchadnezzar’s accession 

year, this chronicle refers to several succeeding campaigns in the 

Hattu-area by Nebuchadnezzar, in his first, second, third and 

fourth years. Mentioning these campaigns, the Society’s dictionary 

says that “evidently in the fourth year he made Judean King 

Jehoiakim his vassal. (2 Kings 24:1)” 

This conclusion, however, is not supported by the Babylonian 

Chronicle. On the contrary, this chronicle indicates that 

Jehoiakim’s vassalage to Babylon began in Nebuchadnezzar’s 

accession-year, or possibly in his first year, and that in the fourth 

year Jehoiakim was already in open revolt against Babylon. To 

demonstrate this, it is necessary to quote important parts of the 

Babylonian Chronicle, from the accession year to the fourth year of 

Nebuchadnezzar: 

Events from c. Sept./Oct. 605 to Jan./Feb. 604 B.C.E.: 

”In (his) accession year Nebuchadnezzar (II) returned to 

Hattu. Until the month Shebat he marched about victoriously in 

Hattu. In the month Shebat he took the vast booty of Hattu to 

Babylon.” 

From May/June to Nov./Dec. 604: 

”The first year of Nebuchadnezzar (II): In the month of Sivan 

he mustered his army and marched to Hattu. Until the month 

63 Equipped for Every Good Work, p. 227.


Kislev he marched about victoriously in Hattu. All the kings of 

Hattu came into his presence and he received their vast tribute.” 

From April/May 603 onwards: 

”The se[cond year]: In the month of Iyyar the king of 

Akkad strenghtened his large army and [marched to Hattu]. 

He encamped [ . . . ] . . . large siege towers he moved acr[oss 

… …from the month] Iyyar until the month [ . . . he marched 

about victoriously in Hattu].” 

In 602: 

”[The third year: In the month . . ., on] the thirteenth [day] 

Nabu-shumu-lishir [ . . . ] [In the month . . . the king of Akkad 

mustered his army and [marched] to Hattu. [ . . . . . . ] He brought 

the vast [booty] of Hattu into Akkad.” 

In 601 (march against Egypt in Kislev = Nov./Dec.): 

”The fourth year: The king of Akkad mustered his army and 

marched to Hattu. [He marched about victoriously] in Hattu. In 

the month Kislev he took his army’s lead and marched to Egypt. 

[When] the king of Egypt heard (the news) he m[ustered] his army. 

They fought one another in the battle-field and both sides 

suffered severe losses (literally, they inflicted a major defeat upon 

one another). The king of Akkad and his army [went back] to 

Babylon.” 64 

From this chronicle it is seen that the whole Hattu-territory 

(primarily Syria-Lebanon but extending to Phoenicia and Palestine) 

became tributary to Nebuchadnezzar as of his accession year. And 

in Nebuchadnezzar’s first year it is explicitly stated that “all the 

kings of Hattu” were tributary to him, which reasonably cannot 

have excepted Jehoiakim. 

Many scholars conclude that Nebuchadnezzar’s fourth year, in 

which Insight on the Scriptures supposes that Jehoiakim’s Babylonian 

vassalage began, was probably the year in which Jehoiakim revolted 

against Nebuchadnezzar, because in that year Nebuchadnezzar 

battled with Egypt, and both seem to have suffered great losses. 

Nebuchadnezzar had to return to Babylon, where he remained in 

the fifth year and “refitted his numerous horses and chariotry.” 65 

This unsuccessful battle with Egypt may have encouraged 

64 A. K. Grayson, Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles (New York: J. J. Augustin 

Publisher, 1975), pp. 100–101. The square brackets indicate damages in the text. 

65 Ibid., p. 101.

Appendix 341 

Jehoiakim to throw off the Babylonian yoke, thus ending his three 

years of vassalage to Babylon. 66 

2 Kings 24:1–7 seems to support the above conclusion. Verse 1 

states that “in his (Jehoiakim’s) days Nebuchadnezzar the king of 

Babylon came up, and so Jehoiakim became his servant for three 

years. However, he turned back and rebelled against him.” As a 

result, Jehovah (through Nebuchadnezzar) “began to send against 

him marauder bands of Chaldeans and marauder bands of Syrians 

and marauder bands of Moabites and marauder bands of the sons 

of Ammon, and he kept sending them against Judah to destroy it, 

according to Jehovah’s word that he had spoken by means of his 

servants the prophets.” — 2 Kings 24:1–2, NW. 

The wording of this passage indicates that these marauder bands 

kept on raiding the territory of Judah for quite a time, evidently for 

some years. Jehovah “began” to send them, and, according to the 

New World Translation, “he kept sending them” against Judah. This 

was not one attack only, like that mentioned in Daniel 1:1, but it 

evidently came upon Judah in waves, time and again. Consequently, 

they could not have begun these attacks in the last year of 

Jehoiakim’s reign, and this also calls for an earlier beginning of 

Jehoiakim’s rebellion. 

The three deportations to Babylon 

Another line of evidence supporting a natural reading of Daniel 

1:1, is that according to 2 Chronicles, chapter 36, verses 7, 10 and 

18 the vessels of the temple were brought to Babylon in three 

successive installments: 

(1) The first time, during Jehoiakim’s reign, “some” of the 

vessels were brought to Babylon. (Verse 7) 

(2) The second time, together with Jehoiachin, the 

“desirable” (NW) or “valuable” (NASB) vessels were brought 

to Babylon. (Verse 10) 

(3) The third time, together with Zedekiah, “all” the 

vessels were brought to Babylon. (Verse 18) 

66 “This battle,” says J. P. Hyatt, “must lie back of Jehoiakim’s change of allegiance, 

when he withheld tribute from Babylonia, probably making an alliance with 

Egypt.” (”New Light on Nebuchadnezzar and Judean History,” Journal of Biblical 

Literature, Vol. 75, 1956, p. 281.) It is also possible that this change of allegiance 

occurred some time before Nebuchadnezzar’s war with Egypt. Nebuchadnezzar’s 

decision to march to Egypt in 601 B.C.E. may have been caused by the alliance 

between the Egyptians and Jehoiakim. — See Mark K. Mercer, “Daniel 1:1 and 

Jehoiakim’s three years of servitude,” Andrews University Seminary Studies, Vol. 

27:3 (Autumn 1989), pp. 188–191.


From these texts we learn that some of the vessels were brought 

to Babylon during Jehoiakim’s reign, the valuable vessels were brought 

at the deportation of Jehoiachin, and all the rest of the vessels were taken 

to Babylon at the end of Zedekiah’s reign. Of the three deportations of 

vessels, the first is clearly referred to at Daniel 1:1, 2, as this text 

states that during the third year of Jehoiakim “some” of the vessels 

were brought to Babylon. 67 

Again, this indicates that Daniel 1:1–2 refers to a deportation 

different from and earlier than that which took place at the end of 

Jehoiachin’s short reign. This gives additional support to the 

conclusion that the phrase “the third year of the kingship of 

Jehoiakim” means what it says―Jehoiakim’s third regnal year, not 

his eleventh. 

Finally, if the deportation mentioned at Daniel 1:1–4 is equated 

with the one that took place at the end of Jehoiachin’s three 

months of reign, why does Daniel state that “Jehovah gave into his 

hand Jehoiakim,” instead of Jehoiachin? (Daniel 1:2) When Jehoiachin 

was taken captive, Jehoiakim had been dead for over three months. 

(2 Kings 24:8–17; 2 Chronicles 36:9–10) There is even evidence to 

show that Jehoiakim was already dead when Nebuchadnezzar, in 

his seventh year, left Babylon for the siege of Jerusalem that ended 

up in Jehoiachin’s deportation. The evidence is as follows: 

Nebuchadnezzar’s siege of Jerusalem during the reign of 

Jehoiachin is also described in the Babylonian chronicle B.M. 

21946. For the seventh year of Nebuchadnezzar this chronicle says: 

From Dec. 598 (or Jan. 597) to March 597 B.C.E.: 

”The seventh year: In the month Kislev the king of Akkad 

mustered his army and marched to Hattu. He encamped against 

the city of Judah and on the second day of the month Adar he 

captured the city (and) seized (its) king. A king of his own choice 

he appointed in the city (and) taking the vast tribute he brought it 

into Babylon. ”68 

67 It is interesting to note that in this first deportation Nebuchadnezzar brought only 

“some” of the vessels from the temple in Jerusalem to Babylon, and these were not 

even the “valuable” vessels. This strongly supports the conclusion that the siege of 

Jerusalem at this time did not end up in the capture of the city. If it did, why did 

he not take the valuable vessels from the temple? If, on the other hand, the siege 

was raised because Jehoiakim capitulated and paid a tribute to Nebuchadnezzar, 

it is quite understandable that Jehoiakim did not include the most valuable 

vessels in the tribute. 

68 A. K. Grayson, op. cit., p. 102. The chronicle is in complete agreement with the 

description of this siege given in the Bible. (2 Kings 24:8–17; 2 Chronicles 36:9– 

10.)

Appendix 343 

Nebuchadnezzar’s army left Babylon “in the month of Kislev,” 

which was the ninth month, and seized Jehoiachin “on the second 

day of the month Adar,” that is, the twelfth month. 69 This means 

that even if the army left Babylon in the beginning of Kislev (which 

this year began on December 18, 598 B.C.E., Julian calendar), the 

interval between the day it left Babylon until the city was captured 

and its king (Jehoiachin) seized, on the second Adar (which 

corresponded to March 16, 597), was three months at the most. 70 

As Jehoiachin ruled for “three months and ten days” (2 

Chronicles 36:9), he evidently had been ruling for some days already 

when Nebuchadnezzar left Babylon in the month of Kislev! If the siege of 

Jerusalem described at Daniel 1:1f. referred to this siege during the 

reign of Jehoiachin, how could it be said that it took place during the 

reign of Jehoiakim (Daniel 1:1), that Nebuchadnezzar came up 

“against him” (2 Chronicles 36:6), and that “Jehovah gave into his 

hand Jehoiakim” (Daniel 1:2), when Jehoiakim was already dead 

when Nebuchadnezzar left Babylon? 

Equating the siege described at Daniel 1:1f. with the one that 

took place during the reign of Jehoiachin (2 Kings 24:10–12; 2 

Chronicles 36:10) is clearly impossible. Daniel and the Chronicler 

at 2 Chronicles 36:6 both obviously describe an earlier siege and an 

earlier deportation, during the reign of Jehoiakim. There is no reason 

to believe that the “third year” of Daniel 1:1 means anything else 

but his third year of reign. There is no evidence at all, either in the 

book of Daniel, in the other books in the Bible or in the 

contemporary Neo-Babylonian historical texts, that regnal years 

were reckoned from a king’s vassalage, or from Nebuchadnezzar’s 

rise to world dominion. Such theories are nothing more than 

unfounded guesses, adopted only in an attempt to defend an 

erroneous application of the seventy years of servitude predicted by 

Jeremiah. 

69 The Babylonians had a second Ululu (an intercalary month) in the seventh year of 

Nebuchadnezzar, thus making Kislev and Adar the tenth and thirteenth months 

respectively that year, although they were normally the ninth and twelfth calendar 

months . This fact does not affect the discussion above. 

70 If the Babylonian army left Babylon some time after Jehoiachin had ascended the 

throne, the siege was of very short duration, two months at most and probably 

less, as the time the army needed to march from Babylon to Jerusalem has to be 

subtracted from the three months from Kislev to Adar. Such a march took at least 

one month. It is possible, however, that a part of the army had left Babylon earlier, 

as 2 Kings 24:10–11 indicates that Nebuchadnezzar arrived at Jerusalem some 

time after the siege had begun. The reason for the short duration of the siege was 

Jehoiachin’s surrender to Nebuchadnezzar on Adar 2 or March 16, 597 B.C.E., 

Julian calendar. (2 Kings 24:12) For an excellent discussion of this siege, see 

William H. Shea, “Nebuchadnezzar’s Chronicle and the Date of the Destruction of 

Lachish III,” in Palestine Exploration Quarterly, No. 111 (1979), pp. 113f.


The three years of training 

But what about the three years of training referred to in Daniel 

1:5, 18, which seem to conflict with a natural reading of Daniel 1:1 

and 2:1? Is there no simpler way to solve this seeming conflict than 

to suppose that the prophet in Daniel 1:1 reckoned Jehoiakim’s 

regnal years from the beginning of his vassalage to Babylon, and 

Nebuchadnezzar’s regnal years in Daniel 2:1 from the year of his 

rise to world dominion? Why should Daniel reckon the regnal years of 

these two kings in such a confusing, abnormal manner when he 

knew that his readers no doubt would misunderstand him? And 

why does he not reckon the regnal years in this peculiar way 

elsewhere in his book, for instance in 7:1, 8:1, 9:1, and 10:1, where he 

follows the customary method of reckoning regnal years? Before 

such strained explanations are adopted, should not a simpler and 

more natural solution be sought? 

It has already been demonstrated in the appendix for chapter 

two (”Methods of reckoning regnal years”) that there is no real 

discrepancy between the third year of Jehoiakim in Daniel 1:1, and 

his fourth year in Jeremiah 25:1 and 46:2. When the existing 

accession and nonaccession year systems are taken into 

consideration, this difference of one year is easily understood. 71 

This solution also has bearing upon the seeming conflict 

between the three years of training and Daniel 2:1. If Daniel 1:1 

refers to Nebuchadnezzar’s accession year (in agreement with the 

Babylonian Chronicle), his “second year” at Daniel 2:1 may be 

regarded as the third year of the training of the Jewish captives. 

According to the Hebrew way of reckoning time periods, whereby 

fractions of time were reckoned as full units, this would make three 

years. 72 The three years are not necessarily three full years. Dr. 

71 A brilliant discussion of this problem may be found in the article by Professor 

Albertus Pieters, “The Third Year of Jehoiakim,” in From the Pyramids to Paul, a 

miscellany in honour of Dr. G. L. Robinson (New York: Thomas Nelson and Sons, 

1935), pp. 180–193. Pieters concludes: “The ‘third year’ of Jehoiakim in Dan. 1:1 is 

the same as the ‘fourth year’ of Jehoiakim in Jer. 25:1 and 46:2, the former being 

reckoned according to the Babylonian and the latter according to the Palestinian 

method of computing the years of the king’s reign.”—Ibid., p. 181. 

72 This way of counting time periods is often termed “inclusive reckoning.” The best 

example is the period of Jesus’ death, from Friday afternoon to his resurrection on 

Sunday morning. Although, chronologically, this period was a little more than two 

nights and one day, Bible writers refer to it as “three days” (Matt. 27:63; Mark 

10:34), even “three days and three nights.” (Matt. 12:40) The Watch Tower Society 

correctly applies it to mean “a portion of each of three days.” (Insight on the 

Scriptures, Vol. 1, p. 593) Another example is the period of the siege of Samaria, 

stated at 2 Kings 18:9–10 to have lasted from the seventh to the ninth year of 

Hoshea; yet the siege is said to have lasted for “three years.” For additional 

examples, see Edwin R. Thiele, The Mysterious Numbers of the Hebrew Kings, new 

revised edition (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1983), p. 52, ftn. 12.

Young presents the following table: 73 

Years of training: 

First year 

Second year 

Third year 

Nebuchadnezzar: 

Year of accession 

First year 

Second year 

Appendix 345 

Applying this simple and biblical method to the problem solves 

the seeming conflict without unfounded theories and strained 

explanations. Many modem Biblical scholars, who regard the book 

of Daniel as authentic, have adopted this simple solution. Gerhard 

F. Rasel, for one, says: 

It is no longer necessary to explain the difficulty between Dan. 

2:1 and 1:1, 18 through textual emendation (H. Ewald, A. 

Kamphausen, J. D. Prince, K. Marti, and J. Jahn) or double 

reckoning (C. B. Michaelis, G. Behrmann). The practice of 

inclusive reckoning, together with the recognition of the 

Babylonian usage of the king’s accession year as not being 

counted, removes all difficulties. 74 

CHRONOLOGICAL TABLES COVERING THE SEVENTY YEARS 

The subsequent tables have been developed in order to facilitate an 

examination of the arguments set forth in this work. The 

Babylonian and Persian Nisan-to-Nisan regnal years and the Judean 

Tishri-to Tishri regnal years have been paralleled with our modem 

calendar. Also, the Babylonian accession years and the Judean 

nonaccession years have been duly considered. The guiding 

principle has been to take the biblical dates as they stand, if nothing 

else is indicated by the context. The tables intend to demonstrate 

how the different biblical dates may be brought into a natural 

harmony with each other, and also with the Babylonian chronicles. 

A few points require specia1 comments: 

A. Josiah’s death at Megiddo, summer 609 (2 Kings 23:29) 

As related in Chapter 5 above (section G-2), the city of Harran, the 

last Assyrian stronghold, was captured and plundered by 

Babylonian and Median forces, either late in 610 or early in 609 

B.C.E. Ashur-uballit, the last Assyrian king, fled. In the summer of 

73 Edward J. Young, The Prophecy of Daniel (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans 

Publishing Co., 1949), pp. 55–56; cf. pp. 267–70. 

74 Gerhard F. Hasel in Andrews University Seminary Studies, Vol. XV, No. 2, 1977, p. 

167.


609 a large Egyptian force headed by Pharaoh Necho marched up 

to the Euphrates to help Ashur-uballit recapture Harran. For some 

unknown reason, the Judean king Josiah tried to stop the Egyptian 

forces at Megiddo, but was defeated and mortally wounded.―2 

Kings 23:29–30; 2 Chronicles 35:20–25. 

At one time it was debated whether Josiah’s death took place in 

609 or 608 B.C.E. 75 This question is now settled, since the 

Babylonian chronicle B.M. 22047 (first published by D. J. 

Wiseman, 1956) shows that the unsuccessful attempt to recapture 

Harran took place between Tammuz and Elul (c. July–September) 

in Nabopolassar’s seventeenth regnal year (609/08). 76 As the 

Egyptian army needed almost a month to travel from Megiddo up 

to the Euphrates, the battle at Megiddo and Josiah’s death took 

place early in the summer of 609 B.C.E. 77 

As may be seen from the tables, this date is in good agreement 

with a Judean Tishri-to-Tishri reckoning of regnal years. 

B. Jehoahaz’ three months of reign and Jehoiakim’s succession 

After the death of Josiah, the Jews made Jehoahaz the son of 

Josiah king in Jerusalem. (2 Chronicles 36:1) After only three 

months of reign, Pharaoh Necho, on his return from the 

Euphrates, removed Jehoahaz and put his brother Jehoiakim on 

the throne in Jerusalem. From then on Judah was a vassal to Egypt. 

As the failed Egyptian-Assyrian attempt to recapture Harran ended 

in Elul (August–September), and the Egyptian retreat from Harran 

to Jerusalem took almost a month, the removal of Jehoahaz and 

installation of Jehoiakim must have occurred in the next month, 

Tishri (September–October). 

According to the Judean nonaccession year system, Jehoiakim’s 

first regnal year, then, should be counted from Tishri 1, 609 B.C.E. 

Jehoahaz’ three months of reign were evidently included in Josiah’s 

reign of 31 years, instead of being counted as a separate regnal year. 

(Jehoiachin’s three months of reign, which ended on March 16, 597 

75 Edwin R. Thiele, The Mysterious Numbers of the Hebrew Kings. New revised edition 

(Grand Rapids, Michigan: The Zondervan Corporation, 1983), pp. 205–206. 

76 D. J. Wiseman, Chronicles of Chaldean Kings (London: The Trustees of the British 

Museum, 1961; first published in 1956), pp. 63–67. See also Hayim Tadmor’s 

article “Chronology of the Last Kings of Judah” in Journal of Near Eastern Studies, 

Vol. XV (1956), p. 228. 

77 A. Malamat, “The Twilight of Judah: In the Egyptian-Babylonian Maelstrom” in 

Supplements to Vetus Testamentum, Vol. XXVIII (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1975), p. 125, 

ftn. 5.

Appendix 347 

B.C.E., was evidently treated in a similar way, being a part of 

Zedekiah’s first regnal year.) 

C. Zedekiah’s first year, 598/97 B.C.E. 

As was shown in the first section of the Appendix for Chapter 5, 

“The ‘third year of Jehoiakim’ (Daniel 1:1–2),” the Babylonian 

chronicle B .M. 21946 dates Jehoiachin’s removal from the throne 

to the second Adar of Nebuchadnezzar’s seventh regnal year, 

corresponding to March 16, 597, Julian calendar, after which 

Zedekiah was appointed king. Following the nonaccession year 

system, Zedekiah’s first year, then, was reckoned from Tishri, 598, 

to Tishri, 597 B.C.E. Zedekiah’s first regnal year was the same as 

Jehoiachin’s first year of exile, which is seen from a comparison of 

Ezekiel 24:1–2 (the dates in Ezekiel are those of Jehoiachin’s exile) 

with 2 Kings 25:1. 

This is quite natural, as Jehoiachin’s three months of reign began 

after Tishri 598. His first regnal year, therefore, would have been 

reckoned from Tishri 1, 598, had he not been removed from the 

throne. Now his three months had to be included in Zedekiah’s 

first regnal year. 

D. Hananiah’s “prophecy”, July–August 594 B.C.E. (Jeremiah 

28:1) 

In Nebuchadnezzar’s tenth year a rebellion broke out in his army 

from the month of Kislev to the month of Tebet (c. November 

595–January 594 B.C.E.), according to the Babylonian Chronicle 

B.M. 21946. 78 If this rebellion caused the revolt plans among the 

Jewish exiles, which also spread to Judah as reflected in Jeremiah, 

chapters 27–29, these plans must have developed soon after the 

Babylonian rebellion. The “prophecy” of Hananiah, that the yoke 

of Babylon would be broken and the exiles brought back within 

two years, is dated to the fifth month of the fourth year of Zedekiah. 

(Jeremiah 28:1–4) This fifth month (Ab, corresponding to July– 

August), therefore, must have fallen in July–August, 594 B.C.E., a 

few months after Nebuchadnezzar had crushed the rebellion. A 

look at the table shows that the fifth month of Zedekiah’s fourth 

year actually fell in July–August, 594 B.C.E., thus indicating that 

the chronological system presented in the tables is correct. 

78 Wiseman, op, cit., p. 73. Cf. A. K. Grayson, Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles 

(Locust Valley, New York: J. J. Augustin Publisher, 1975), p. 102.


E. The siege of Jerusalem, 589–587 B.C.E. 

It has been debated whether the siege lasted for eighteen months, 

or for about two-and-a-half years. 79 According to a Nisan-to-Nisan 

regnal year the siege lasted for eighteen months (2 Kings 25:1–4), 

but this conflicts with the statement in Ezekiel 33:21, which says 

that an escapee from the destruction of Jerusalem reached Ezekiel 

“in the twelfth year, in the tenth month, on the fifth day of the 

month.” This would mean that the escapee reached Ezekiel with 

the message that the city had been taken about one-and-a-half years 

after the destruction of Jerusalem. This seems incredible. 

Therefore, it is often argued that Ezekiel 33:21 originally read 

“eleventh year,” which is supported by the Syriac Version, the Greek 

Septuagint Version, and a few Hebrew manuscripts. 80 But if a Tishrito-Tishri 

regnal year is applied, the well-attested reading of “twelfth 

year” may be retained, with the escapee reaching Ezekiel about six 

months after the capture of Jerusalem, which seems more natural. 

Further, it is shown by this reckoning that the siege lasted for 

about two-and-a-half years, instead of eighteen months. 

F. Jehoiachin’s 37th year of exile, 562/61 B.C.E. 

In 2 Kings 25:27 (=Jeremiah 52:31), Jehoiachin’ s 37th year is 

equated with the accession year of Evil-Merodach. Here we have 

an excellent confirmation of the conclusion that the Judean kings 

applied a Tishrito-Tishri regnal year. 

Evil-Merodach ascended to the throne in the autumn of 562 

B.C.E., and his accession-year ran to Nisan, 561 B.C.E. 

Jehoiachin’s release from prison took place in the twelfth month of 

Evil-Merodach’s accession year (Jeremiah 52:31), on the twentyfourth 

day. This corresponded to March 30, 561 B.C.E. (Julian 

calendar). 

If Nisan-to-Nisan regnal years are applied to Jehoiachin’s exile, 

his 37th year cannot be counted from Nisan, 561 B.C.E., as this 

month fell after his release from prison. But if his 37th year of exile 

is reckoned from Nisan, 562 B.C.E., in order to retain the 

synchronism to Evil-Merodach’s accession year, his first year of 

exile has to be reckoned from Nisan, 598, to Nisan, 597 B.C.E. Is 

this likely? 

79 “The Nations Shall Know that I Am Jehovah”—How? (Brooklyn, N.Y.: Watchtower 

Bible and Tract Society, 1971), pp. 285–287, argues for a siege of eighteen months. 

80 1bid., p. 286.

Appendix 349 

As his deportation took place around Nisan 1, 597 B.C.E. (2 

Kings 24:10–17; 2 Chronicles 36:10, and the Babylonian Chronicle 

B.M. 21946:11–13), this would mean that his first year of exile fell 

nearly exactly one year before he was deported! As this is 

impossible, his years of exile must have been reckoned according 

to Tishri-to-Tishri years.


Appendix 351


For Chapter Seven: 

A REVIEW OF: 

Appendix 353 

ROLF FURULI, PERSIAN CHRONOLOGY AND THE 

LENGTH OF THE BABYLONIAN EXILE OF THE JEWS 

(OSLO: ROLF FURULI A/S, 2003) 

Persian Chronology and the Length of the Babylonian Exile of the Jews is the 

first of two volumes in which Rolf Furuli attempts to revise the 

traditional chronology for the Neo-Babylonian and Persian periods. 

Furuli states that the reason for this venture is that this chronology 

is in conflict with the Bible. He insists that the Bible 

“unambiguously,” “explicitly,” and “definitely” shows that 

Jerusalem and the land of Judah were desolate for 70 years, until 

the Jewish exiles in Babylon returned to Judah as a result of the 

decree Cyrus issued in his first regnal year, 538/37 B.C.E. (pp. 17, 

89, 91). This implies that the desolation of Jerusalem in 

Nebuchadnezzar’s 18th regnal year took place 70 years earlier, in 

607 B.C.E. As has been amply documented in the present work, 

this is contrary to modern historical research, which has fixed the 

18th year of Nebuchadnezzar in 587/86 B.C.E. Furuli does not 

explicitly mention the 607 B.C.E. date in this volume, perhaps 

because a more detailed discussion of the Neo-Babylonian 

chronology is reserved for his not-yet-published second volume. 

Most of the ten chapters in this first volume, therefore, contain a 

critical examination of the reigns of the Persian kings from Cyrus 

to Darius II. The principal claim of this discussion is that the first 

year of Artaxerxes I should be moved 10 years backward, from 464 

to 474 B.C.E. Furuli does not mention that this is an old idea that 

can be traced back to the noted Jesuit theologian Denis Petau, 

better known as Dionysius Petavius, who first presented it in a 

work published in 1627. Petavius’ revision had a theological basis, 

because, if the “seventy weeks [of years],” or 490 years, of Daniel 

9:24–27 are to be counted from the 20th regnal year of Artaxerxes 

(Neh. 2:1ff.) to 36 C.E. (his date for the end of the period), 

Artaxerxes’ 20th year must be moved from 445 back to 455 B.C.E. 

Furuli says nothing about this underlying motive for his proposed 

revision.


The hidden agenda 

Furuli published this book at his own expense. On the back 

cover of the book he presents himself this way: 

Rolf Furuli is a lecturer in Semitic languages at the University of Oslo. 

He is working on a doctoral thesis which suggests a new understanding 

of the verbal system of Classical Hebrew. He has for many years worked 

with translation theory, and has published two books on Bible 

translation; he also has experience as a translator. The present volume is 

a result of his study of the chronology of the Ancient world for more 

than two decades. 

Furuli does not mention that he is a Jehovah’s Witness, and that 

for a long time he has produced apologetic texts defending 

Watchtower exegesis against criticism. His two books on Bible 

translation are nothing more than defenses of the Witnesses’ New 

World Translation of the Bible. He fails to mention that for many 

years he has tried to defend Watchtower chronology and that his 

revised chronology is essentially a defense of the Watchtower 

Society’s traditional chronology. (See above, pages 308, 309.) He 

describes his chronology as “a new chronology,” which he calls 

“the Oslo Chronology,” (p. 14) when in fact the 607 B.C.E. date 

for the destruction of Jerusalem is the chronological foundation for 

the claims and apocalyptic messages of the Watchtower 

organization, and the 455 B.C.E. date for the 20th year of 

Artaxerxes I is its traditional starting point for its calculation of the 

“seventy weeks” of Daniel 9:24–27. 

Despite these facts, Furuli nowhere mentions the Watchtower 

Society or its chronology. Nor does he mention my detailed 

refutation of this chronology in various editions of the present 

work, The Gentile Times Reconsidered (GTR), first published in 1983, 

despite the fact that in circulated “organized collections of notes” 

he has tried to refute the conclusions presented in its earlier 

editions. Furuli’s silence on GTR is noteworthy because he 

discusses R. E. Winkle’s 1987 study of the Biblical 70-year period 

which presents mostly the same arguments and conclusions as are 

found in the first edition of GTR (1983). (See above, p. 235, note 

57.) As a Jehovah’s Witness, Furuli is forbidden to interact with 

former members of his organization. If this is the reason for his 

feigned ignorance of my study, he is acting as a loyal Witness — 

not as a scholar. 

Clearly, Furuli has an agenda, and he is hiding it.

Appendix 355 

ATTEMPTS TO REVISE THE NEO-BABYLONIAN CRONOLOGY 

Although Volume I of Furuli’s work principally is an attempt at 

revising the Persian chronology, some parts of it also contain 

arguments for a lengthening of the Neo-Babylonian chronology: 

(A) In chapter 6 Furuli claims there are dated business tablets 

from the 17th regnal year of Nabonidus that overlap Cyrus’ reign, 

which, if they are correct, “suggest that Nabonid reigned longer” 

(p. 132). 

(B) As the chronology of the Neo-Babylonian period is fixed 

by a number of astronomical tablets, Furuli devotes much space on 

trying to undermine the reliability of these tablets, including the 

astronomical diary VAT 4956 from the 37th year of 

Nebuchadnezzar. In Chapter 1 he claims there are only two 

principal astronomical sources for the chronology of the Neo- 

Babylonian and Persian periods. In the same chapter he describes 

nine “potential sources of error” in the Babylonian astronomical 

tablets. 

(C) In Chapter 2 Furuli argues that the astronomical texts 

probably mainly contain, not actual observations, but backward 

calculations performed during the Seleucid era (after 312 B.C.E.). 

(D) In Chapter 4, finally, Furuli discusses Jeremiah’s prophecy 

of the 70 years, arguing that the writers of Daniel 9:2 and 2 

Chronicles 36:21 “unambiguously” applied the 70 years to the 

period of the desolate state of Jerusalem. 

In this review I will critically examine these claims one by one. 

As the Persian chronology is not the subject of the present work, 

Furuli’s chronological revision of that period will not be examined 

here. A more detailed review of Furuli’s book that includes 

comments on his revised Persian chronology is found on this site: 

http://user.tninet.se/~oof408u/fkf/english/furulirev.htm 

This material has also been included at the end of this book. 

For some works often referred to in the discussion below the 

following abbreviations are used: 

ADT Abraham J. Sachs and Hermann Hunger, Astronomical 

Diaries and Related Texts from Babylonia (Wien: Verlag der 

Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Vol. I — 1988, II 

— 1989, II1 — 1996, V — 2001). 

CBT Erle Leichty et al, Catalogue of the Babylonian Tablets in the 

British Museum, Vols. 6, 7, and 8 (1986, 1987, and 1988). These 

volumes list the tablets from Sippar held at BM.


LBAT Abraham J. Sachs (ed.), Late Babylonian Astronomical and. 

Related Texts. Copied by T G. Pinches and J. N Strassmaier (Providence, 

Rhode Island: Brown University Press, 1955). 

PD Richard A. Parker and Waldo H. Dubberstein, Babylonian 

Chronology 626 B.C. – A.D. 75 (Providence, Rhode Island: Brown 

University Press, 1956). 

(A) The supposed “overlap” between the reigns of 

Nabonidus and Cyrus 

An argument repeatedly used by Furuli is that the existence of 

dated business documents showing chronological “overlaps” of 

some days, weeks, or months between a king and his successor 

proves that “something is wrong with our chronological scheme. 

In that case it is likely that the successor did not succeed the 

previous king in the year when he died. There may be one or more 

years in between, or there may even be another ruler between the 

two kings in question. This way to test a chronology is very 

important because there are discrepancies between all the kings of 

the New Babylonian Empire and several of the early kings of the 

Persian Empire.” (p. 132) 

This argument is critically examined and disproved in the 

Appendix of the present work, where the conceivable “overlaps” 

between the reigns of all the kings of the Neo-Babylonian period 

are examined in detail. (See above, pp. 321–329.) The only 

suggested “overlap” not discussed is that between the 17th year of 

Nabonidus and the accession-year of Cyrus. The reason for this is 

not just that there are no dated texts that show such an overlap 

between the two reigns, but also because there are a number of 

tablets that definitely prove that Cyrus succeeded Nabonidus in his 

17th year. Five such texts are discussed in the present work on 

pages 135–139 above. 

Nevertheless, Furuli claims that some business tablets show an 

overlap between Nabonidus’ 17th year and Cyrus’ accession-year. 

His “Table 18” on p. 132 shows that the earliest tablet extant from 

the reign of Cyrus (CT 57:717) is dated to day 19, month VII 

(Tishri) of his accession-year, i.e., three days after the fall of 

Babylon. This date is correct. But then Furuli goes on to list three 

tablets in his table that seem to be dated to Nabonidus after the 

earliest tablet dated to Cyrus, indicating an overlap of five months 

between the two kings:

Month-day-year: 

VII -- 19 — acc. 

VIII -- 10 — 17 

IX -- xx — 17 

XII -- 19 — 17 

King: 

Cyrus 

Nabonidus 

Nabonidus 

Nabonidus 

Appendix 357 

Furuli concludes: 

If one or more of the three tablets dated in months 8 and 12 of 

Nabonid are correct, this suggests that Nabonid reigned longer than 17 

years. (p. 132) 

But none of the three “overlapping dates” are real. 

(A-1) Nabonidus “VIII —10 — 17” (BM 74972): 

As Furuli explains, PD rejected this date because “the month 

sign is shaded” in J. N. Strassmaier’s copy of the text published in 

1889. 81 They had good reasons for doing this because F. H. 

Weissbach, who collated the tablet in 1908, explained that the 

month name was highly uncertain and “in any case not 

Arahsamnu” (month VIII). 82 

Actually, there is an even more serious error with the date. Back 

in 1990 I asked C. B. F. Walker at the British Museum to take 

another look at the date on the original tablet. He did this together 

with two other Assyriologists. They all agreed that the year is 16, 

not 17. Walker says: 

On the Nabonidus text no. 1054 mentioned by Parker and 

Dubberstein p. 13 and Kugler, SSB I1388, I have collated that tablet (BM 

74972) and am satisfied that the year is 16, not 17. It has also been 

checked by Dr. G. Van Driel and Mr. Bongenaar, and they both agree 

with me. 83 

(A-2) Nabonidus “IX — xx —17” (No. 1055 in 

Strassmaier, Nabonidus): 

This text does not give any day number, the date above just 

being given as “Kislimu [= month IX], year 17 of Nabonidus”. The 

text, in fact, contains four different dates of this kind, in the 

following chronological disorder: Months IX, I, XII, and VI of 

“year 17 of Nabonidus”. None of these dates refers to the time 

when the tablet was drawn up. Such a date is actually missing on 

81 PD ( Parker & Dubberstein’s Babylonian Chronology, 1956), p. 13. The tablet is 

listed as No. 1054 in J. N. Strassmaier, Inschriften von Nabonidus, König von 

Babylon (Leipzig, 1889). 

82 See F. X. Kugler, Sternkunde und Sterndienst in Babel [SSB], Vol. II:2 (1912), p. 

388 

83 Letter Walker to Jonsson, November 13, 1990.


the tablet. As F. X. Kugler explained, the tablet belongs to a 

category of texts containing installment dates or delivery dates 

(mashshartum). 84 Such dates were given at least one month, and 

often several months in advance. That is why PD states (p. 14) that 

“this tablet is useless for dating purposes” As shown by its 

contents, No. 1055 is an administrative text giving the dates for 

deliveries of certain amounts of barley in year 17 of Nabonidus. 85 

(A-3) Nabonidus “XII -19 —17” (BM 55694): 

This tablet was copied by T. G. Pinches in the 1890’s and was 

finally published in 1982 as CT 57:168. 86 It is also listed in CBT 6, 

p. 184, where the date is given as “Nb(-) 19/12/13+” (= day 19, 

month 12, year 13+). 87 Evidently the royal name and the year 

number are both damaged and only partially legible. “Nb(-)” shows 

that the royal name begins with “Nabu-”. This could refer to either 

Nabopolassar, Nebuchadnezzar, or Nabonidus. If it is Nabonidus, 

the damaged year number, “13+”, may refer to any year between 

his 13th and 17th year. An examination of the original tablet might 

perhaps give some clues. 

None of the three tablets listed by Furuli, then, can be used to 

prove that Nabonidus’ 17th year overlapped the accession-year of 

Cyrus, suggesting that “Nabonid reigned longer than 17 years” 

(B) Attempts at undermining the reliability of the 

astronomical tablets 

(B-1) Only three principal sources for the chronology of 

the ancient world? 

Furuli is well aware that the most damaging evidence against his 

so-called “Oslo Chronology” is provided by the astronomical 

cuneiform tablets. He therefore strives to belittle the importance of 

most of these tablets, stating that there are only two principal 

astronomical sources on which the chronology of the Neo- 

Babylonian and Persian periods can be based. (Pages 15, 24, 45) At 

least one of these, he claims, contradicts the third principal 

chronological source—the Bible: 

84 F. X. Kugler, SSB II:2 (1912), pp. 388, 389. 

85 P.-A. Beaulieu in the Journal of Near Eastern Studies, Vol. 52:4 (1993), pp. 256, 

258. 

86 CT 57:168 = Cuneiform Texts from Babylonian Tablets in the British Museum, Part 

57 (1982), No. 168. 

87 Erle Leichty, Catalogue of the Babylonian Tablets in the British Museum (CBT), Vol. 

6 (1986), p. 184 (82-7-14, 51).

Appendix 359 

There are three principal sources with information regarding the 

chronology of the New Babylonian and Persian kings, namely, Stem 

Kambys 400, VAT 4956 and the Bible. The information in these three 

sources cannot be harmonized. (p. 21) 

Furuli knows, of course, that for the fixing of the absolute date 

for the fall of Babylon to 539 B.C.E., at least one astronomical text 

is needed. As the diary VAT 4956 is disastrous for his Oslo 

Chronology, he is forced to choose Strm Kambys 400 for this 

purpose, claiming that this is “the tablet that is most important for 

Persian chronology” (p. 128) and “the only source on the basis of 

which an absolute chronology can be made regarding the year 

Cyrus conquered Babylon.” (p. 134) 

The poor quality of this tablet has already been pointed out in 

the present work. As was noticed already by F. X. Kugler in 1903, 

it is probably the least reliable of all astronomical tablets. (See 

above, pp. 84–88.) Modern scholars even question whether it 

contains any observations at all. Dr. John M. Steele, for example, 

explains: 

It is also unwise to base any conclusions concerning the Babylonian 

records on this tablet alone, since it does not fall into any of the common 

categories of text. In particular, it is not certain whether this text contains 

observations or calculations of the phenomena it records. At least some 

of the data must be calculated. For instance, the full run of lunar six 

timings for the 7th year of Cambyses cannot all have been measured; 

clouds would surely have prevented their observation on at least some 

occasions. The lunar six data must therefore have been either all 

calculated, as suggested by Kugler (1907: 61–72), or be a mixture of 

observation and calculation. There is also debate concerning whether the 

two lunar eclipses were observed or calculated. 88 

The fact is that the chronology of the Neo-Babylonian and 

Persian eras is fixed by nearly 50 astronomical observational tablets 

(diaries, eclipse texts, and planetary texts). Many of them are quite 

extensive and detailed and serve as principal sources for the 

absolute chronology of this period. Most of these tablets are 

88 John M. Steele, Observations and Predictions of Eclipse Times by Early Astronomers 

(Dordrecht-Boston-London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2000), p. 98. C. B. F. 

Walker refers, for example, to the inaccurate magnitude reported for one the two 

eclipses in the text, “but,” he adds, “the Cambyses text is now understood to 

contain a series of predictions rather than observations.” — Walker in John Curtis 

(ed.), Mesopotamia in the Persian Period (London: The Trustees of the British 

Museum, l997), p. 18.


published in volumes I and V of Sachs & Hunger’s ADT. 89 For 

example, there are about 25 diaries from the reign of Artaxerxes II 

(404–358 BCE), 11 of which have the royal name and regnal dates 

preserved. Most, if not all, of these appear to be, not later copies, 

but original compilations from the 46-year reign of Artaxerxes II. 90 

Therefore, to fix the absolute chronology of the reign of 

Artaxerxes II or any other Persian king, Strm Kambys 400 is needless 

and irrelevant. Nor is it needed to fix the reigns of Cambyses and 

Cyrus, which can be more securely fixed by other texts. 

(B-2) Potential “sources of errors” in the Babylonian 

astronomical tablets 

Attempting to further weaken the reliability of the astronomical 

texts, Furuli, on pages 29–37, describes nine “potential sources of 

error” that might undermine the trustworthiness of tablets that 

conflict with his Oslo Chronology, such as VAT 4956. On closer 

inspection, however, the supposed “sources of error” turn out to 

be either (a) trivial and immaterial, (b) not applicable to the tablets 

used for fixing the Neo-Babylonian and Persian chronology and 

therefore irrelevant, or (c) mere figments of imagination. All of 

Furuli’s “potential sources of errors” fall into one of these three 

categories. Some examples are given below. 

(B-2a) Trivial and immaterial sources of error: 

An example of (a) is Furuli’s description of “the process of 

writing down the data.” His discussion of this focuses on the 

astronomical diary VAT 4956, dated to the 37th year of the reign 

of Nebuchadnezzar. Furuli explains: 

The tablet itself is a copy made a long time after the original was 

made, but even the original was not made at the time the observations 

were made. The tablet covers a whole year, and because clay hardly can 

be kept moist for 12 months, the observations must have been written 

down on quite a lot of smaller tablets, which were copied when the 

original was made. (pp. 30, 31) 

As far as the copying and compilation procedure is concerned, 

Furuli’s description is correct and well known to Assyriologists. 

Copying errors do exist, but they usually create few problems in 

tablets that are fairly well preserved and detailed enough to be 

89 ADT = Astronomical Diaries and Related Texts from Babylonia. 

90 Communication H. Hunger to C. O. Jonsson, dated January 26, 2001.

Appendix 361 

useful for chronological purposes. As discussed in chapter 4 of the 

present work (p. 162 above), the dated lunar and planetary 

positions recorded in VAT 4956 evidently contain a couple of 

scribal errors. These errors, however, are minor and easily detected 

by modem computations of the observations recorded. 

Thus, on the obverse (front) side, line 3 has day “9”, which 

already P. V. Neugebauer and E. F. Weidner pointed out is a 

scribal error for day “8”. 91 Similarly, obverse, line 14, has day “5”, 

which is obviously an error for day “4”. The remaining legible 

records of observed lunar and planetary positions, about 30, are 

correct, as is demonstrated by modem calculations. In their recent 

examination of VAT 4956, Professor F. R. Stephenson and Dr. D. 

M. Willis conclude: 

The observations analyzed here are sufficiently diverse and accurate 

to enable the accepted date of the tablet i.e. 568–567 B.C.— to be 

confidently confirmed. 92 

(B-2b) Inapplicable and therefore irrelevant “sources of 

error”: 

An example of (b) is Furuli’s reference to the gradual change in 

the speed of the earth’s rotation. (p. 33) As is pointed out in the 

present work (p. 334 above), this is no problem for the period 

under discussion, as the rate of the decrease in the earth’s rotation 

has been established back to, and even over a century beyond the 

Neo-Babylonian period. From the middle of the 8th century B.C.E. 

and on, therefore, we are on “safe ground” with respect to this 

source of error. 

(B-2c) Imaginary “source of error”, no. 1: 

An example of (c) is Furuli’s reference to the supposed 

“crudeness of observations” recorded on the astronomical tablets. 

On page 32 he claims: 

One problem is the crudeness of the observations. Because the 

tablets probably were made for astrological reasons, it was enough to 

know the zodiacal sign in which the moon or a certain planet was found 

at a particular point of time. This does not give particularly accurate 

observations. 

By this statement Furuli creates a false impression that the lunar 

and planetary positions recorded on the Babylonian astronomical 

tablets are given only in relation to zodiacal signs of 30 degrees 

each. 

91 A translation and discussion of the tablet by Neugebauer & Weidner was published 

in 1915. See above, p. 157, note 8. 

92 F. R. Stephenson & D. M. Willis in J. M. Steele & A. Imhausen [eds.], Under One 

Sky. Astronomy and Mathematics in the Ancient Near East (Munster: Ugarit-Verlag, 

2002), pp. 423–428. (Emphasis added)


He supports this by quoting a scholar, Curtis Wilson, who in a 

review of a book by R. R. Newton made such a claim, stating that, 

“The position of the planet is specified only within an interval of 

30°.” 93 

But anyone with even a cursory acquaintance with the 

Babylonian astronomical tablets knows that Wilson’s claim — 

repeated by Furuli — is false. Although it is true that many 

positions recorded on the tablets are given with reference to 

constellations along the zodiacal belt, the great majority of the 

positions, even in the earliest diaries, are given with reference to 

stars or planets. The division of the zodiacal belt into signs of 30 

degrees each took place later, during the Persian era, and it is not 

until “toward the end of the 3rd century B.C.” that “diaries begin 

to record the dates when a planet moved from one zodiacal sign to 

another.” 94 During the entire 800-year period from ca. 750 BCE to 

ca. 75 CE the Babylonian astronomers used a number of stars close 

to the ecliptic as reference points. As Professor Hermann Hunger 

explains in a work also used by Furuli: 

In order to give the position of the moon and the planets a number of 

stars close to the ecliptic are used for reference. These have been called 

“Normalsterne” [Normal Stars] by Epping, and the term has remained in 

use ever since. (ADT, Vol. I, p. 17; emphasis added.) 

On pages 17–19 of the same work, Hunger lists 32 such normal 

stars known from the tablets. Noel Swerdlow states: “By far the 

most numerous observations of planets in the Diaries are of their 

distances ‘above’ or ‘below’ and ‘in front of’ or ‘behind’ normal 

stars and each other, measured in cubits and fingers. 95 

Such detailed observations are shown by VAT 4956, in which 

about two-thirds of the lunar and planetary positions recorded are 

given in relation to normal stars and planets. And, in contrast to 

positions related to constellations, where the moon or a planet 

usually is just said to be “in front of,” “behind,” “above,” “below,” 

or “in” a certain constellation, the records of positions related to 

normal stars also give the distances to these stars in “cubits” (of ca. 

22.5 degrees each) and “fingers” (1/24 of the cubit), as Swerdlow 

points out. Although the measurements are demonstrably not 

93 C. Wilson in Journal of the History of Astronomy 15:1 (1984), p. 40. 

94 H. Hunger in N. M. Swerdlow [ed.], Ancient Astronomy and Celestial Divination 

(London: The MIT Press, 1999), p. 77. Cf. B. L. Van der Waerden, “History of the 

Zodiak,” Archiv fur Orientforschung 16 (1952/1953), pp. 216–230. 

95 N. M. Swerdlow, The Babylonian Theory of the Planets (Princeton, New Jersey, 

1998), p. 39.

Appendix 363 

mathematically exact, they are considerably more precise than 

positions related only to constellations. 

By parsing all the astronomical diaries in the first two 

volumes of Sachs/Hunger’s ADT, Professor Gerd Grasshoff 

“obtained descriptions of 3285 events, of which 2781 are complete 

without unreadable words or broken plates. Out of those are 1882 

topographical events [i.e., positions related to stars and planets], 

604 are lunar observations called Lunar Six . . . and 295 are 

locations of a celestial object in a constellation.” 96 Thus, two-thirds 

of the positions are related to stars or planets, whereas only about 

10 percent are related to constellations. 

(B-2c) Imaginary “source of error”, no. 2: 

Another example of (c) is Furuli’s claim that the 12,000-foot 

mountain range to the east of Babylon might prevent or preclude 

observations: 

To the east of Babylon there is a mountain range rising to about 

12,000 feet above sea level, while the area to the west of the city is a flat 

desert. ... it is obvious that the high mountains to the east of Babylon 

would prevent some observations. (p. 29) 

But the Zagros mountains to the east of Babylon create no 

serious problems. The higher parts of the range begin about 230 

kilometers east of Babylon with Kuh-e Varzarin at about 9500 feet 

above sea level. Mountains “about 12,000 feet above sea level” lie 

considerably farther away. Due to the distance and the curvature of 

the earth, the Zagros mountains are not visible from Babylon, at 

least not from the ground, as can be testified by anyone who has 

been there. Professor Hermann Hunger, for example, says: 

I have been there [in Iraq], three years, of which two months were 

spent in Babylon. There are no mountains visible from Babylon. 97 

It is possible, of course, that an observer atop the 90-meter-high 

Etemenanki ziggurat in Babylon (if the observations could have 

been made from there) could have seen a very thin, irregular line of 

mountains far to the east, although this, too, is doubtful. This 

might have affected the arcus visionis to some degree (the smallest 

angular distance of the sun below the horizon at the first or last 

96 Gerd Grasshoff, “Normal Stars in Late Astronomical Babylonian Diaries,” in Noel 

M.Swerdlow [ed.], Ancient Astronomy and Celestial Divination (London: The MIT 

Press, 1999), p. 107. 

97 Communication Hunger to Jonsson December 4, 2003.


visibility of a heavenly body above the horizon), which in turn 

could have changed the date of the first and last visibility of a 

heavenly body by a day or two. 

It should be emphasized that this might possibly be a problem 

with astronomical texts that report only phenomena close to the 

horizon. Observations of lunar and planetary positions related to 

specific stars and constellations higher in the sky would not be 

affected, and it is usually these that are the most useful for 

chronological purposes. Most of the about 30 lunar and planetary 

positions recorded on the astronomical tablet VAT 4956 belong to 

this category. 

None of Furuli’s “potential sources of error” weakens the 

reliability of VAT 4956. I am aware of only one scholar who has 

tried to overcome the evidence provided by this diary, namely, E. 

W. Faulstich, founder and director of the Chronology-History 

Research Institute in Spencer, Iowa, USA. Faulstich believes it is 

possible to establish an absolute Bible chronology without the aid 

of extra-Biblical sources, based solely on the cyclical phenomena of 

the Mosaic law (sabbath days, sabbath and jubilee years) and the 

cycle of the 24 sections of the levitical priesthood. One 

consequence of his theory is that the whole Neo-Babylonian period 

has to be moved backward one year. Because this conflicts with the 

absolute dating of the period based on the astronomical tablets, 

Faulstich argues that VAT 4956 contains information from two 

separate years mixed into one. This idea, however, is based on 

serious mistakes. I have thoroughly refuted Faulstich’s thesis in the 

unpublished article, “A critique of E. W. Faulstich’s Neo- 

Babylonian chronology” (1999), available from me upon request. 

(C) Are most astronomical positions calculated rather 

than observed? 

The “most acute problem for making an absolute chronology 

based on astronomica1 tablets,” Furuli claims, is that many, 

“perhaps most positions of the heavenly bodies on such tablets, are 

calculated rather than observed.” (p. 15) Is this true? 

As discussed in chapter 4 of the present work (pp. 154–156 

above), Babylonian astronomers at an early stage were able to 

predict certain astronomical phenomena, such as the occurrences 

of lunar eclipses and certain planetary positions. These calculations 

presuppose that they had worked out theories for dating and 

locating such phenomena. In fact, about 300 texts have been found

Appendix 365 

containing lists of lunar and planetary positions at regular intervals. 

(See above, p. 156.) Such arithmetical tables were termed 

“ephemerides” by Professor Otto Neugebauer, who published all 

extant tablets of this kind in his three-volume work, Astronomical 

Cuneiform Texts (1955). All these tablets are late, almost all dating 

from the 3rd to the 1st centuries B.C.E. 

Does this mean, then, that all or most of the phenomena 

recorded on the astronomical tablets might have been computed 

rather than observed, as Furuli claims? Were the Babylonian 

astronomers able to do this? Are there indications in the recorded 

data that they did just that? 

(C-.1) Phenomena the Babylonian astronomers were 

unable to calculate 

Although the Babylonian astronomers were able to calculate 

and predict certain astronomical events, the observational texts — 

diaries, planetary texts, and eclipse texts — contain reports of 

several phenomena and circumstances connected with the 

observations that could not have been calculated. 

That the diaries usually record real observations is shown by their 

reports of climatological phenomena. For example, the scribes 

repeatedly report when bad weather prevented astronomical 

observations. We often find reports about “clouds and rain of 

various sorts, described in detail by numerous technical terms, as 

well as fog, mist, hail, thunder, lightning, winds from all directions, 

often cold, and frequent ‘pisan dib’, of unknown meaning but always 

associated with rain.” 98 Other recorded phenomena were rainbows, 

solar halos and river levels. None of these could have been 

retrocalculated much later. What, then, about the astronomical 

phenomena? 

As discussed in chapter 4 of the present work (p. 185 above), 

there were a number of planetary phenomena recorded in the texts 

that the Babylonian astronomers were unable to calculate. These 

included conjunctions of planets with the moon and other planets, 

with their distances. VAT 4956 records a number of such — for 

the Babylonian astronomers — unpredictable and incalculable 

phenomena. 

With respect to lunar eclipses, the Babylonian astronomers were 

certainly able to predict and retrocalculate the occurrences of lunar 

98 N. M. Swerdlow, The Babylonian Theory of the Planets (1998), p. 18.


eclipses, but they were unable to predict or calculate a number of 

important details about them. (See above, p. 185.) This has been 

discussed in detail by Dr. John M. Steele. 99 Commenting on the 

claim that the eclipse records on the lunar eclipse tablets might be 

retrocalculations by Babylonian astronomers in the Seleucid era, 

Steele explains: 

You were absolutely right when you argued that the Babylonians 

could not have retrocalculated the early eclipse records. The Saros cycle 

could have been used to determine the date of eclipses, even centuries 

earlier, but none of the Babylonian methods could have allowed them to 

calculate circumstances such as the direction of the eclipse shadow, the 

visibility of planets during the eclipse, . . . 

Although the Babylonians could calculate the time of the eclipses, 

they could not do so to the same level of accuracy as they could observe 

— there is a clear difference of accuracy between eclipses they said were 

observed and those they say were predicted (this is discussed in my 

book), which proves that the “observed” eclipses really were 

observed. 100 

(C-2) Most of the contents of the observational texts are 

observations 

Although the observational texts, due to particular 

circumstances such as bad weather, occasionally contain calculated 

events , most of the entries are demonstrably based on actual 

observations. That this is the case with the Diaries is directly 

indicated by the Akkadian name engraved at the end and on the 

edges of these tablets: natsaru sha ginê, which means “regular 

watching.” (ADT, Vol. I, p. 11) 

Scholars who have examined these tablets in detail agree that 

they contain mostly genuine observations. Professor Hermann 

Hunger gives the following description of the various kinds of 

astronomical data recorded in the Diaries: 

Lunar Six [i.e., the time differences between the settings and risings 

of the sun and the moon just before and after conjunction and 

opposition]; planetary phases, like first and last visibility . . . conjunctions 

between planets and the so-called Normal Stars . . . eclipses; solstices and 

equinoxes; phenomena of Sirius. Toward the end of the 3rd century 

99 John M. Steele, Observations and Predictions of Eclipse Times by Early 

Astronomers (Dortrecht-Boston-London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2000); also 

in his article, “Eclipse Prediction in Mesopotamia,” Archive for History of Exact 

Sciences, Vol. 54 (2000), pp. 421–454. 

100 Communication Steele to Jonsson, March 27, 2003.

Appendix 367 

B.C., Diaries begin to record the dates when a planet moved from one 

zodiacal sign into another. The rest of the Diaries’ contents is nonastronomical. 

Hunger adds: 

Almost all of these items are observations. Exceptions are the solstices, 

equinoxes, and Sirius data, which were computed according to a scheme 

. . . furthermore, in many instances when Lunar Sixes, lunar or solar 

eclipses, or planetary phases could not be observed, a date or time is 

nevertheless given, marked as not observed. Expected passings of 

Normal Stars by the moon are sometimes recorded as missed because of 

bad weather, but never is a distance between moon and Normal Star 

given as computed. 101 

In summary, Furuli’s claim that “perhaps most positions of the 

heavenly bodies on such tablets, are calculated rather than 

observed” is groundless. It is refuted by statements in the tablets 

themselves and by the fact that they contain data that the 

Babylonians were unable to calculate. These circumstances are 

diametrically opposed to the suggestion that the data in the 

astronomical diary VAT 4956 might have been calculated later so 

that possibly “there never was an ‘original tablet’.” (Furuli, p. 30) 

(C-3) A theory of desperation 

If the entries on the observational tablets — diaries, and lunar 

and planetary tablets — record mostly demonstrably genuine 

observations, and if the Babylonian astronomers were unable to 

compute and retrocalculate many of the astronomical and other 

data reported, how, then, is it possible for anyone to wriggle out of 

the evidence provided by these tablets? 

Because the tablets often contain so many detailed observations 

dated to specific regnal years that they can be safely fixed to 

particular Julian years, the only escape is to question the 

authenticity of the regnal year numbers found on the tablets. 

This is what Furuli does. He imagines that “a scribe could sit 

down in the 2nd century and make a tablet partly of some 

phenomena covering many years, partly on the basis of theory (the 

three schemes) and partly on the basis of tablets from a library” 

that might show real observations. Then, upon discovery that the 

dates on the library tablets conflicted with the theoretical data, 

“these erroneous data could be used to ‘correct’ the correct data of 

101 H. Hunger in Swerdlow (ed.), Ancient Astronomy and Celestial Divination (1999), 

pp. 77, 78. (Emphasis added)


his library tablet, to the effect that the tablet he was making would 

contain wrong data of regnal years:’ (Furuli,p.41) 

Furuli indicates that not only the dates on the lunar and 

planetary tablets but also the dates on the diaries might have been 

tampered with by the Seleucid scholars in the same way. Referring 

again to the fact that the earliest extant diaries are copies, he says: 

But what about the regnal year(s) of a king that are written on such 

tablets? Have they been calibrated to fit an incorrect theoretical 

chronological scheme, or have they been copied correctly? (Furuli, p. 42) 

Furuli realizes, of course, that his Oslo Chronology is 

thoroughly contradicted by the Babylonian astronomical tablets. 

That is the reason he proposes, as a last frantic resort, the theory 

that these tablets might have been redated by Seleucid scholars to 

bring them into agreement with their own supposed theoretical 

chronology for earlier times. Is this scenario likely? What does it 

imply? 

(C-4) The scale of the supposed Seleucid chronological 

revisions 

To what extent does Furuli’s Oslo Chronology differ from the 

traditional chronology? In a chronological table on pages 219–225 

covering the 208 years of the Persian era (539–331 BCE), Furuli 

shows, reign by reign, the difference between his chronology and 

the traditional one. It turns out that the only agreement between 

the two is the dating of the reigns of Cyrus and Cambyses — the 

period from the fall of Babylon (539 BCE) to 522 BCE, a period of 

17 years. By giving the usurper Bardiya one full year of reign after 

Cambyses, Furuli moves the whole 36-year reign of Darius I one 

year forward. Then he moves the reigns of Darius’ successors 

Xerxes and Artaxerxes I 10 years backward by adding 10 years to 

the reign of the latter, creating a coregency of 11 years between 

Darius I and Xerxes. 

But Furuli also assigns a one-year reign to the usurper Sogdianus 

between Artaxerxes I and his successor Darius II. The effect of this 

is that the remaining reigns up to 331 BCE are all moved one year 

forward. The end result is that Furuli’s Oslo Chronology is at 

variance with the traditional chronology for the Persian era for 191 

of its 208 years, or for 92 percent of the period. 

But this is not all. As mentioned in the introduction, Furuli 

wants to add 20 extra years to the Neo-Babylonian period 

somewhere after the reign of Nebuchadnezzar — between 562 

and 539 BCE. The effect of this — what Furuli calls the “domino

Appendix 369 

effect” — is that not only the reign of Nebuchadnezzar but all the 

reigns of his predecessors are moved backward 20 years. 

Because the Babylonian astronomical archive starts with the 

reign of Nabonassar, 747–734 BCE, Furuli’s Oslo Chronology is at 

variance with the traditional chronology for most, if not the whole, 

of the Babylonian era from 747 to 539 BCE. This means that the 

disagreement between the two runs to more than 90 percent of the 

416-year period from 747 to 331 BCE. This also means that the 

Oslo Chronology is contradicted by more than 90 percent of the 

astronomical observational texts — diaries, eclipse texts, and 

planetary texts — dated to this period. Because these tablets record 

thousands of observations dated to particular regnal years, months, 

and days within this period, we begin to get some idea of the scale 

of the chronologica1 revisions the Seleucid scholars must have 

engaged in — according to Furuli’s theory. Yet, this is only a 

fraction of the full scope of the necessary revisions. 

(C-5) The scope of the original astronomical archive 

It should be kept in mind that the extant archive of ca. 1300 

nonmathematical and principally observational astronomical 

cuneiform tablets is only a fraction of the scope of the original 

archive available to the Seleucid scholars. In a lecture held at a 

conference in 1994, Professor Hunger explained: 

To give you an idea of how much was originally contained in that 

archive, and how much is still preserved, I made a few rough estimates. 

From well preserved Diaries, I found that in each month about 15 lunar 

and 5 planetary positions, both in relation to Normal Stars, are reported. 

Also, every month the so-called lunar Six are recorded. Each year will in 

addition contain 3 Sirius phases, 2 solstices and 2 equinoxes, at 1east 4 

eclipse possibilities or eclipses, and about 25 planetary phases. Together, 

this results in about 350 astronomical observations per year. In 600 

years, 210,000 observations are accumulated. Now I do not know 

whether the archive was ever complete to this extent. Sometimes copies 

of older Diaries indicate that things were missing in the original. But on 

the whole, this is the order of magnitude. By counting the number of 

reasonably (i.e., not completely, but more than half) preserved months, I 

arrived at ca. 400 months preserved in dated Diaries (undated fragments 

do not help for the purposes of this lecture). If we compare this to a 

duration of 600 years for the archive, we see that we have preserved ca. 5% 

of the months in Diaries. 102 

102 H. Hunger in Swerdlow (ed.), Ancient Astronomy and Celestial Divination (1999), 

p. 82. (Emphasis added)


If only five percent of the original Babylonian astronomical archive 

is preserved today, the scale of the chronological revisions Furuli 

thinks Seleucid copyists engaged in becomes apparent. To bring 

their whole archive into harmony with their supposed theoretical 

chronology, they would have had to redate thousands of tablets 

and tens of thousands of observations. Is it likely that they believed 

so strongly in a supposed theoretical chronology that they bothered 

to redate four centuries’ worth of archives containing thousands of 

tablets? The idea is patently absurd, asinine. 

We can also ask why the Seleucid scholars would work out a 

theoretical chronology for earlier centuries when a reliable 

chronology for the whole period back to the middle of the 8th 

century could easily be extracted from the extensive astronomical 

archive at their disposal. Is it not much more realistic to conclude 

that their chronology was exactly the one found in the inherited 

archive of tablets, an archive that had been studied and expanded 

by successive generations of scholars up to and including their 

own? 

It should be noted that, to make any claims at all about dates in 

his Oslo chronology, Furuli must rely on the dating of the tablets 

that the Seleucids supposedly revised. But if one assumes that his 

chronology is valid, then so must be the dates recorded on the 

tablets — which destroys his claim that the Seleucids revised the 

tablets. Thus, Furuli’s argument is internally inconsistent and 

cannot be correct. 

Another problem is what became of the original pre-Seleucid 

tablets. A necessary consequence of Furuli’s theory is that almost 

all extant tablets should reflect only the erroneous theoretical 

chronology of the Seleucid scholars, not what Furuli regards as the 

original and true chronology — the Oslo Chronology. In his view, 

therefore, all or almost all extant tablets can only be the late revised 

copies of the Seleucid scholars. Thus, on page 64, he claims: 

As in the case of the astronomica1 diaries on clay tablets, we do not 

have the autographs of the Biblical books, but only copies. 

This is certainly true of the Biblical books, but is it true of the 

astronomical diaries? Is there any evidence to show that all the 

astronomical tablets preserved today are only copies from the 

Seleucid era?

Appendix 371 

(C-6) Are all extant tablets late copies from the Seleucid 

era? 

It is certainly true that some of the earliest diaries, including 

VAT 4956, are later copies. As discussed in chapter 4 of the 

present work, they frequently reflect the struggle of the copyist to 

understand the ancient documents they were copying, some of 

which were broken or otherwise damaged. Twice in the text of 

VAT 4956, for example, the copyist added the comment “broken 

off,” indicating he was unable to decipher some word in the 

original. Often the documents used archaic terminology that the 

copyists tried to modernize. What about diaries from later times? 

As an example, there are about 25 diaries from the 46-year reign 

of Artaxerxes II (404–358 B.C.E.), 11 of which not only preserve 

the dates (year, month, day) but also the name of the king. (ADT, 

Vol. I, pp. 66–141) Some of them are extensive and contain 

numerous observations (e.g., nos. –372 and –366). None of these 

tablets show any of the above-mentioned signs of being later 

copies. Is it likely, then, that they, or at least some of them, are 

originals? 

This question was sent to Professor Hunger a few years ago. He 

answered: 

In my opinion, the diaries from the time of Artaxerxes II can all be 

from his reign. You know that the larger diaries are all copies in the 

sense that they are collections of smaller tablets which covered shorter 

periods. But that does not mean that they were copied much later. To 

me it would make most sense if after every half a year the notes were 

copied into one nice exemplar. I had a quick look through the edition 

and did not find any remarks like ‘broken” which are an indication that 

the scribe copied an older original. So I would answer your question “is 

it likely” by “Yes”. 103 

These tablets, therefore, do not reflect any “theoretical 

chronology” supposedly invented by the later Seleucid scholars. 

The tablets might very well be original documents. We cannot take 

it for granted that they are late copies from the Seleucid era. And 

the same holds true, not only for the diaries from the reign of 

Artaxerxes II but for most of the observational tablets dating from 

before the Seleucid era. Even if some of the diaries and other 

tablets dated to the earliest centuries are later copies, it is usually 

not known how late these copies are, or whether they were copied 

in the Seleucid period or earlier. 

103 Communication Hunger to Jonsson, January 26, 2001.


In conclusion, the theory that Seleucid scholars worked out an 

erroneous hypothetical chronology for earlier times that they 

systematically embodied into the astronomical tablets they were 

copying cannot be supported by the available facts. It is not based 

on historical reality and is a desperate attempt to save cherished but 

false dates. 

(D) Unfounded claims about the Biblical 70 years 

As is discussed in chapter 5 of the present work, the prophet 

Jeremiah directly applies the 70 years to the length of Babylon’s 

dominion over the nations, not to the length of the desolation of Jerusalem 

and the Jewish exile: 

. . . these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy years. 

(Jeremiah 25:11, NIV) 

When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come back to 

you and fulfill my gracious promise to bring you back to this place. 

(Jeremiah 29:10, NIV) 

These texts clearly apply the 70-year period to Babylon, not to 

Jerusalem. Quoting the above NIV rendering of the two verses, 

Furuli even admits this, stating that “the text does not say explicitly 

that it refers to an exile for the Jewish nation. If we make a 

grammatical analysis in 25:11, we find that ‘these nations’ is the 

grammatical subject, and in 29:10, ‘Babylon’ is the patient, that is, 

the nation that should experience the period of 70 years.” (p. 75) 

(D-1) Is Furuli’s view of the 70 years really supported by 

Daniel and the Chronicler? 

Attempting to evade this undesirable conclusion, Furuli turns to 

the 70-year passages at Daniel 9:2 and 2 Chronicles 36:20, 21, 

stating that “the writers of Daniel and 2 Chronicles understood the 

words of Jeremiah to imply a 70-year exile for the Jewish nation.” 

After quoting the NIV for these two texts, he claims: 

As the analysis below shows, the words of Daniel and the Chronicler 

are unambiguous. They show definitely that Daniel and the Chronicler 

understood Jeremiah to prophesy about a 70-year period for the Jewish 

people when the land was desolate. (p. 76) 

The discussion of the two passages in chapter 5 above (pp. 215- 

225) shows this claim to be groundless. Both passages may easily 

be harmonized with the clear statements of Jeremiah.

Appendix 373 

Although Daniel links or ties the 70 years to the desolate state of 

Jerusalem, this does not mean that he equated the two periods. To 

link and to equate are two different things. This was noticed, for 

example, by Dr. C. F. Keil, who in his grammatical analysis of 

Daniel 9:2 concluded that Daniel connected and yet distinguished 

the two periods, just as is done in Jeremiah’s prophecy. Only after 

the completion of the 70 years “for Babylon,” JHWH would visit 

the Jewish exiles and bring them back to Jerusalem to end its 

period of desolation. This is what had been predicted at Jeremiah 

29:10, and Daniel’s statement fully agrees with this, according to 

Keil. (See above, p. 219, note 31. )104 

In his discussion of 2 Chronicles 36:20, 21 Furuli ignores verse 

20 and quotes only verse 21: 

to fulfill Jehovah’s words by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had 

paid off its sabbaths. All the days of lying desolate it kept sabbath, to 

fulfill seventy years. 

It may be noted that this verse starts with a subordinate clause 

and, more specifically, with a purpose clause: to fulfill . . . . Furuli 

quotes the verse out of context. To know what event would fulfill 

“Jehovah’s words by the mouth of Jeremiah,” it is necessary to 

examine the main or principal clause, which is found in verse 20. 

This verse says: 

Furthermore, he [Nebuchadnezzar] carried off those remaining from 

the sword captive to Babylon, and they came to be servants to him and his sons 

until the royalty of Persia began to reign; 

The Chronicler states that the service to the kings of 

Babylon ended when “the royalty of Persia began to reign.” This 

event took place, he goes on to say in the next verse (21), “to fulfill 

Jehovah’s words by the mouth of Jeremiah, . . . to fulfill seventy 

years.” 

The obvious meaning is that the cessation of the servitude 

under Babylon by the Persian takeover in 539 BCE fulfilled the 70- 

year prophecy of Jeremiah. The Chronicler does not reinterpret 

Jeremiah’s statements to mean 70 years of desolation for Jerusalem, 

as Furuli claims. On the contrary, he sticks very closely to 

Jeremiah’s description of the 70 years as a period of servitude 

under Babylon, and he ends this period with the fall of Babylon, 

104 The rather free Bible translation by Eugene H. Peterson well expresses the 

distinction made in Jeremiah 29:10 between the end of the two periods, the 70 

years for Babylon and Jerusalem’s period of desolation: “As soon as Babylon’s 

seventy years are up and not a day before, I’ll show up and take care of you as I 

have promised and bring you back home.” (The Message. The Prophets, 2000, p. 

230)


exactly as Jeremiah had predicted at Jeremiah 25:12 and 27:7. (See 

chapter 5 above, pp. 220, 221.) 

(D-2) Jeremiah 25:9–12: 70 years of servitude — for 

whom? 

Returning to Jeremiah’s prophecy, Furuli first focuses on Jeremiah 

25:11, which says: 

And all this land must become a devastated place, an object of 

astonishment, and these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy years. 

(NIV) 

As was pointed out earlier, Furuli starts his discussion of the 70- 

year prophecy by admitting that Jeremiah applies the 70 years to 

Babylon, not to Jerusalem. Having concluded (falsely, as has been 

shown above and in chapter 5) that Daniel 9:2 and 2 Chronicles 

36:21 unambiguously state that Judah and Jerusalem lay desolate 

for 70 years, Furuli realizes that the meaning of Jeremiah 25:11 has 

to be changed to be brought into agreement with his conclusion. 

The clause “these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy 

years” is very clear in Hebrew: 

weâbdû haggôyîm hâêlleh et-melech bâbel shivîm 

shânâh 

and-will-serve-they the-nations these king [of] Babel 

seventy year[s] 

As Furuli points out (p. 82), the particle et before melech bâbel 

(”king of Babel”) is a marker indicating that melech bâbel is the 

object. The word order is typical in Hebrew: verb-subject-object. 

There are no grammatical problems with the clause. It simply and 

unambiguously says that “these nations will serve the king of Babel 

seventy years.” Furuli, too, admits that “this is the most natural 

translation.” (p. 84) How, then, can Furuli force it to say something 

else? 

Furuli first claims that “the subject (‘these nations’) is vague and 

unspecified” Actually, it is not. It simply refers back to “all these 

nations round about” referred to in verse 9. Furuli goes on to state 

that the subject in the clause might not be “these nations” in verse 

11 but “this land” (Judah) and “its inhabitants” in verse 9. Verse 

11, therefore, really says that it is only the inhabitants of Judah, not 

“these nations,” that will serve the king of Babylon 70 years. How, 

then, is the occurrence of “these nations” in the clause to be 

explained? Furuli suggests that they might be part of the object,

Appendix 375 

the king of Babel, who “would be a specification of” these nations. 

The clause could then be translated: 

and they will serve these nations, the king of Babel, seventy years (p. 

84) 

Furuli also suggests that the particle et might not here be used as 

an object marker but as a preposition with the meaning “with.” 

Based on this explanation, the clause could even be translated: 

and they will serve these nations together with the king of Babel seventy 

years (p. 84) 

These reconstructions are not supported by any Bible 

translations. Not only are they far-fetched, they are refuted by the 

wider context. The prediction that the nations surrounding Judah 

would serve the king of Babylon is repeated in Jeremiah 27:7 in a 

way that is impossible to misunderstand: 

And all the nations must serve him and his son and his grandson until the 

time even of his own land comes. 

The immediate context of the verse proves conclusively that 

“the nations” referred to include all the non-Jewish nations in the 

Near East. Furuli’s linguistic acrobatics, therefore, are unnecessary, 

mistaken, and a case of special pleading. 

Furuli’s far-fetched and forced reconstruction of the verse 

seems to be an attempt to bring it in agreement with the wording 

of the Septuagint version (LXX), to which he then refers in 

support. (p. 84) Some of the problems with the LXX version of 

Jeremiah are discussed in chapter 5 above, ftn. 8 on pp. 195, 196. 

(D-3) Jeremiah 29:10: The meaning of the 70 years for 

Babylon 

Jeremiah 29:10 is discussed in chapter 5 above, pp. 209–214. 

The verse explicitly states that the 70 years refer to Babylon, not 

Jerusalem: 

This is what the LORD says: ‘When seventy years are 

completed for Babylon [l e bâbel] I will come to you and fulfill my 

gracious promise to bring you back to this place’ [i.e., to 

Jerusalem]. (NIV) 

Furuli notes that most Bible translations render the preposition 

le as “to” or “for” and that only a very few (usually older) 

translations render it as “at” or “in.” (Furuli, p.85) Of the latter, he 

mentions six: NWT, KJV , Harkavy, Spurrell, Lamsa, and the 

Swedish Church Bible of 1917. 

Alexander Harkavy’s edition from 1939 contains the Hebrew 

text together with an English translation. Furuli does not seem to


have noticed that Harkavy states in the preface that the English 

text is that of the Authorized Version, that is, the KJV. George 

Lamsa’s translation has been strongly criticized because of its heavy 

dependence on the KJV. Also in Jeremiah, chapter 29, he almost 

slavishly follows KJV. His “at Babylon,” therefore, means nothing. 

I have not been able to check Helen Spurrell’s translation. It was 

published in London in 1885, not 1985, as Furuli’s Bibliography 

erroneously shows, so it is not a modem translation. 

The Swedish Church Bible of 1917 has recently been “replaced” 

by two new translations, Bibel-2000 and Folkbibeln (1998). Both 

have “for Babylon” at Jeremiah 29:10. In answer to my questions, 

the translators of both translations emphasized that l e bâbel at 

Jeremiah 29:10 means “for Babylon” not “at” or “in” Babylon. 

Remarkably, even the new revised Swedish edition of the NWT has 

changed the earlier “in Babylon” (Swedish “i Babylon”) in the 1992 

edition to “for Babylon” (Swedish: “för Babylon”) in the 2003 

edition. (See above, p. 211, ftn. 26) 

Because the rendering “for Babylon” contradicts the theory that 

the 70 years refer to the period of Jerusalem’s desolation, Furuli 

needs to defend the notably infrequent rendering “at” or “in” 

Babylon. He even claims that the preposition “for” gives the 70 

years “a fuzzy meaning:” 

If “for” is chosen, the result is fuzziness, because the number 70 

then loses all specific meaning. There is no particular event marking 

their beginning nor their end, and the focus is wrong as well, because it 

is on Babylon rather than on the Jews. (p. 86) 

This is an incredible statement and another example of Furuli’s 

special pleading. It is difficult to believe that Furuli is totally 

ignorant of the fact that both the beginning and the end of 

Babylon’s supremacy in the Near East were marked by 

revolutionary events — the beginning by the final crushing of the 

Assyrian empire and the end by the fall of Babylon itself in 539 

BCE. Surely he must know that, according to secular chronology, 

exactly 70 years passed between these two events. Modern 

authorities on the history of this period agree that the definite end 

of Assyria occurred in 610/609 BCE. In the box on page 234 of 

chapter 5 above, for example, four leading scholars are quoted to 

this effect: viz. Professor John Bright and three leading 

Assyriologists, Donald J. Wiseman, M. A. Dandamaev, and Stefan 

Zawadski. It would be easy to multiply the number. Another 

example is Professor Klas R.Veenhof. He describes how the last

Appendix 377 

king of Assyria, Assuruballit II, after the destruction of the capital 

Nineveh in 612 BCE, retreated to the provincia1 capital Harran, 

the last Assyrian stronghold, where he succeeded in holding out for 

another three years, supported by Egypt. Veenhof writes: 

It was to no advantage that Egypt supported Assyria; the Babylonian 

and Median armies took the city in 610 B.C., and in the following year 

[609] they warded off their last defensive attempt. Therewith a great 

empire was dissolved. 105 

The same historical information is given by Professor Jack 

Finegan on page 252 (§430) in the new revised edition of his wellknown 

Handbook of Biblical Chronology. Quoting Jeremiah 29:10 he 

concludes: 

The “seventy years . . . for Babylon,” of which Jeremiah speaks are 

therefore the seventy years of Babylonian rule, and the return of Judah 

from exile is contingent upon the end of that period. Since the final fall 

of the Assyrian empire was in 609 B.C. (§430), and the New Babylonian 

empire endured from then until Cyrus the Persian took Babylon in 539, 

the period of Babylonian domination was in fact seventy years (609 — 

539 = 70). 106 

Certainly, no one acquainted with Neo-Babylonian history can 

honestly claim that the 70 years “for Babylon” have a “fuzzy 

meaning” because no particular events mark the beginning and end 

of the period. 

(D-4) Jeremiah 29:10: The Septuagint and Vulgate 

versions 

Furuli next points out that “the Septuagint has the dative form 

babylôni” but with “the most natural meaning being ‘at Babylon’.” 

The statement reveals a surprising ignorance of ancient Greek. As 

every Greek scholar will point out, the natural meaning of the 

dative form babylôni is “for Babylon.” It is an exact, literal 

translation of the original Hebrew l e bâbel, which definitely means 

“for Babel” in this text, as discussed on pp. 213, 214 above. True, 

at Jeremiah 29:22 (LXX 36:22) the dative form babylôni is used in 

the local sense, “in Babel,” but it gets this sense only because of the 

preceding Greek preposition en, “in”: 

And from them a malediction will certainly be taken on the part of 

the entire body of exiles of Judah that is in Babylon (en babylôni) 

Furuli further refers to the rendering of the Latin Vulgate, in 

Babylon, which means, as he correctly explains, “in Babylon.” This 

105 Klas R. Veenhof, Geschichte des Alten Orients bis zur Zeit Alexanders des Grossen 

(Göttingen, 2001), pp. 275, 276. (Translated from German) 

106 Jack Finegan, Handbook of Biblical Chronology (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson 

Publishers, 1998), p. 255.


translation most probably influenced the KJV of 1611, which in 

turn has influenced several other earlier translations. The point is 

that all translations derived from or influenced by the Vulgate, such 

as the KJV, are not independent sources. 

(D-5) Jeremiah 29:10: The Hebrew preposition le (lamed) 

The preposition l e is the most common preposition in the 

Hebrew Old Testament. According to a recent count, it occurs 

20,725 times, 1352 of which are found in the book of Jeremiah. 107 

What does it mean at Jeremiah 29:10? Since the first edition of the 

present work was published in 1983, this question has been asked 

of dozens of qualified Hebraists around the world. I contacted 

some and so did some of my correspondents. Although some of 

the Hebraists explained that l e in a few expressions has a local sense 

(“in, at”), in most cases it does not, and they unanimously reject 

this meaning at Jeremiah 29:10. Some of them are quoted in 

chapter 5 above, pp. 213, 214. 

Furuli disagrees with their view. He believes that because l e is 

used in a local sense in some expressions at a few places it is likely 

used in this sense also in Jeremiah 29:10. He argues: 

Can it really be used in the local sense “at”? It certainly can, and The 

Dictionary of Classical Hebrew lists about 30 examples of this meaning, one 

of which is Numbers 11:10, “each man at (le) the entrance of his tent”. 

So, in each case when le is used, it is the context that must decide its 

meaning. For example, in Jeremiah 51:2 the phrase lebâbel means “to 

Babylon”, because the preceding verb is “to send”. But lirûshâlâm [the 

letters li at the beginning of the word is a contraction of le+yod] in 

Jeremiah 3:17 in the clause, “all the nations will gather in Jerusalem” has 

the local meaning “in Jerusalem”, and the same is true with the phrase 

lîhûdâ in Jeremiah 40:11 in the clause, “the king of Babylon had left a 

remnant in Judah”. (p. 86) 

Well and good, but do these examples allow l e bâbel at Jeremiah 

29:10 to be translated “in” or “at Babylon”? Is this really a likely 

translation? Is it even a possible one? This question was sent to 

Professor Ernst Jenni in Basel, Switzerland, who is undoubtedly 

the leading authority today on Hebrew prepositions. So far, he has 

written three volumes on three of the most common Hebrew 

prepositions, b e (beth), ke (kaph), and l e (lamed). In the volume on 

107 Ernst Jenni, Die hebräischen Prepositionen. Band 3: Die Präposition Lamed 

(Stuttgart, etc.: Verlag Kohlhammer, 2000), p. 17.

Appendix 379 

l e (lamed) he devotes 350 pages to the examination of this 

preposition. 108 His answer of October 1, 2003, quoted on page 214 

above, is worth repeating here: 

My treatment of this passage is found in the Lamed-book p. 109 

(heading 4363). The rendering in all modem commentaries and 

translations is “for Babel” (Babel as world power, not city or land); this 

is clear from the language as well as also from the context. 

By the “local meaning” a distinction is to be made between where? 

(“in, at”) and where to? (local directional “to, towards”). The basic 

meaning of l is “with reference to”, and with a following local 

specification it can be understood as local or local-directional only in 

certain adverbial expressions (e.g., Num. 11,10 [Clines DCH IV, 481b] “at 

the entrance”, cf. Lamed pp. 256, 260, heading 8151). At Jer. 51,2 l is a 

personal dative (”and send to Babel [as personified world power] 

winnowers, who will winnow it and empty its land” (Lamed pp. 84f., 

94)). On Jer. 3,17 “to Jerusalem” (local terminative), everything 

necessary is in Lamed pp. 256, 270 and ZAH 1, 1988, 107–111. 

On the translations: LXX has with babylôni unambiguously a dative 

(”for Babylon”). Only Vulgata has, to be sure, in Babylon, “in Babylon”, 

thus King James Version “at Babylon”, and so probably also the New 

World Translation. 

I hope to have served you with these informations and remain with 

kind regards, 

E. Jenni. 

[Translated from the German. Emphasis added.] 

In view of this specific and authoritative information, Furuli’s 

arguments for a local meaning of l e at Jeremiah 29:10 can be safely 

dismissed. 

(D-6) What about the 70 years at Zechariah 1:12 and 7:5? 

That the 70-year texts at Zechariah 1:12 and 7:5 refer to a period 

different from the one in Jeremiah, Daniel, and 2 Chronicles is 

demonstrated in detail in chapter 5 above, pp. 225–229. There is 

no need to repeat the argumentation here. Furuli’s attempt to 

equate the 70 years in Zechariah with the 70 years of Jeremiah, 

Daniel, and the Chronicler evades the real problem. 

According to Zechariah 1:12, Jerusalem and the cities of Judah 

had been denounced for “these seventy years.” If this denunciation 

108 Ernst Jenni, ibid.


ended when the Jews returned from the exile after the fall of 

Babylon, as Furuli holds, why does our text show that the cities still 

were being denounced in the second year of Darius, 520/519 

BCE? Furuli has no explanation for this, and he prefers not to 

comment on the problem. 

The same holds true of Zechariah 7:4,5. How can the 70 years 

of fasting have ended in 537 BCE, as Furuli claims, when our text 

clearly shows that these fasts were still being held in the fourth year 

of Darius, 518/517 BCE? Furuli again ignores the problem. He just 

refers to the fact that the Hebrew verbs for “denounce,” “fast,” 

and “mourn” are all in the Hebrew perfect, stating that, “There is 

nothing in the verbs themselves which demands that the 70 years 

were still continuing at speech time.” (p. 88) True, but they do not 

demand the opposite, either. The verb forms in the passage prove 

nothing. 

But the context does. It clearly shows that the cities were still 

being denounced “at speech time,” in 519 BCE, and that the fasts 

were still being held “at speech time,” in 517 BCE, about 70 years 

after the siege and destruction of Jerusalem in 589–587 BCE. That 

is why this question was raised in 519 BCE: Why is Jehovah still 

angry at Jerusalem and the cities? (Zechariah 1:7–12) And that is 

also why this question was raised in 517 BCE: Shall we continue to 

hold these fasts? (Zechariah 7:1–12) Furuli’s interpretation (which 

echoes the Watchtower Society’s) implies that the denunciation of 

the cities and the keeping of the fasts had been going on for about 

90 — not 70 — years, directly contradicting the statements in the 

book of Zechariah. 

Summary 

In this review of Furuli’s book, we have seen a number of 

insurmountable difficulties that his Oslo Chronology creates not 

only with respect to the extra-Biblical historical sources but also 

with the Bible itself. 

The amount of evidence against Furuli’s revised chronology 

provided by the cuneiform documents — in particular the 

astronomical tablets — is enormous. Furuli’s attempts to explain 

away this evidence are of no avail. His idea that most, if not all, of 

the astronomical data recorded on the tablets might have been 

retrocalculated in a later period is demonstrably false. Furuli’s final, 

desperate theory that the Seleucid astronomers — and there were 

many — systematically redated almost the whole astronomical 

archive inherited from earlier generations of scholars is divorced 

from reality.

Appendix 381 

With respect to the Biblical passages on the 70 years, we have 

seen to what extremes Furuli has been forced to go in his attempts 

to bring them in agreement with his theory. He has been unable to 

prove his repeated claim that the 70-year passages in Daniel and 2 

Chronicles unambiguously state that Jerusalem was desolate for 70 

years. His linguistic interpretation of 2 Chronicles 36:21 is 

misconstrued because he ignores the main clause in verse 20, which 

plainly makes the servitude end at the Persian conquest of Babylon 

in 539 BCE. Furuli’s linguistic rerenderings of the passages in 

Jeremiah are no better. To reconcile Jeremiah 25:11 with his 

theory, he admits that he must discard “the most natural 

translation” of the verse. And to bring Jeremiah 29:10 into 

agreement with his theory, he must reject the near-universal 

rendering “for Babylon” in favor of the unsupportable “in 

Babylon” or “at Babylon” — translations rejected by all competent 

modern Hebraists. 

Furuli’s approach, then, is not Biblical as he claims, but sectarian. 

As a conservative Jehovah’s Witness scholar, he is prepared to go 

to any length to force the Biblical passages and the historical 

sources into agreement with the Watchtower Society’s Gentile 

times chronology — a chronology that is the foundation 

cornerstone of the movement’s claim to God-given authority. As I 

have amply documented in this review, this sectarian agenda forces 

Furuli to fabulate more wildly than Sheherazade; the legendary 

Persian queen and storyteller of One Thousand and One Nights.

THE 20TH YEAR OF ARTAXERXES 

AND THE "SEVENTY WEEKS" OF DANIEL 

The questions about the chronology of the reign of Artaxerxes I 

and its supposed relation to the 70 weeks of Daniel 9:24–27 would 

require a minor book to answer, and such a book is, in fact, what I 

have been planning to write for some years. I have been collecting 

material on the subject for many years, and in 1989 I even wrote a 

brief draft in Swedish. Other projects, however, have occupied my 

spare time since then, and I don’t expect to be able to resume the 

work on the 70 weeks within the next few years. The following 

discussion is an examination of the arguments brought forth by the 

Watch Tower Bible & Tract Society in support of the idea that 

Artaxerxes I acceeded to the throne in 475 BC, not in 465 BC as is 

held by modern historians. 

What follows is a brief summary of the Swedish paper on the 

chronology of Artaxerxes’ reign. 

1. Was Xerxes a coregent with his father Darius? 

It is true that the Watch Tower Society attempts to solve the 

problems created by their prolongation of Artaxerxes’ length reign 

from 41 to 51 years (his accession being dated to 475 instead of 

465 BC) by abbreviating the reign of his predecessor Xerxes (485– 

465 BC) from 21 to 11 years, arguing that the first 10 years of 

Xerxes’ rule was a co-rule with his father Darius. 

There is not the slightest evidence in support of such a coregency. 

The Watch Tower Society’s discussion on pages 614–616 of its 

Bible dictionary Insight on the Scriptures, volume 2 (1988), is a 

miserable distortion of the historical evidence. Thus, on page 615 

they claim: 

There is solid evidence for a coregency of Xerxes with his 

father Darius. The Greek historian Herodotus (VII, 3) says: 

"Darius judged his [Xerxes’] plea [for kingship] to be just and 

declared him king. But to my thinking Xerxes would have been 

made king even without this advice." This indicates that Xerxes 

was made king during the reign of his father Darius. 

If we look up Herodotus’ statement, however, we will discover that 

he, in the very next few sentences, directly contradicts the Watch 

Tower Society's claim that there was a ten year long coregency of 

382

The 20 th Year of Artaxerxes 383 

Xerxes with Darius by stating that Darius died one year after this 

appointment of Xerxes as his successor. Herodotus says: 

Xerxes, then, was publicly proclaimed as next in succession to 

the crown, and Darius was free to turn his attention to the 

war. Death, however, cut him off before his preparations 

were complete; he died in the year following this incident and 

the Egyptian rebellion, after a reign of thirtysix years, and so 

was robbed of his chance to punish either Egypt or the 

Athenians. After his death the crown passed to his son 

Xerxes. 

What we find, then, is that Darius appointed Xerxes his successor 

one year (not ten!) before his own death. Further, Herodotus does not say 

that Darius appointed Xerxes his coregent, but his successor. (Note, for 

instance, the wording of the passage quoted by the Watch Tower 

Society in Aubrey de Sélincourt's translation in the Penguin Books). 

In the preceding paragraphs, Herodotus explains that a common 

rule among Persian kings before they went out to war was to 

appoint their successors to the throne, in case they themselves 

would be killed in the battles. This custom, he says, was also 

followed by Darius. 

The Watch Tower Society, then, quotes Herodotus completely out 

of context, leaving out the subsequent sentences that refute their 

claim. Incredibly, they introduce this forgery by terming it "solid 

evidence"! 

Other "solid evidence" presented in their Bible dictionary in 

support of the coregency is of the same quality, for example the 

bas-reliefs found in Persepolis, which Herzfeld in 1932 felt 

indicated a coregency of Xerxes with Darius. (Insight 2, p. 615) This 

idea, however, is dismissed by modern scholars. The very fact that 

the crown prince is pictured as standing behind the throne shows that 

he is not a king and a coregent, but an appointed successor. 

Second, no names are found on the relief, and the conclusion that 

the man on the throne is Darius and the crown prince is Xerxes is 

nothing but a guess. J. M. Cook, in his work on the history of 

Persia, argues that the crown prince is Artobazanes, the oldest son 

of Darius. (Cook, The Persian Empire, New York 1983, p. 75) Other 

modern scholars, such as A. B. Tilia and von Gall, have argued that 

the king cannot be Darius but must be Xerxes, and that the crown 

prince, therefore, is the son of Xerxes! (Cook, p. 242, ftn. 24)


E As "evidence from Babylonian sources" for the claimed 

coregency the Watch Tower Society first refers to "a palace for 

Xerxes" that was built in Babylon in 498–496 BC. But there is no 

evidence to show that this palace was built "for Xerxes". J. M. 

Cook refers to Herodotus’ statement that Xerxes was appointed 

successor to the throne as late as one year before Darius’ death in 

486 BC and adds: 

If Herodotus is correct in this, the residence constructed for 

the king’s son in Babylon in the early 490s must have been 

intended for Artobazanes. (Cook, pp. 74, 75) 

The palace, then, proves nothing about a coregency of Xerxes with 

Darius. 

The final "evidence" for the claimed coregency consists of two clay 

tablets held to be dated in the accession year of Xerxes. According 

to the Watch Tower Society both tablets are dated several months 

before the last tablets dated in Darius’ final regnal year. (Insight 2, p. 

615) This "overlapping" of the two reigns, it is argued, indicates a 

coregency. 

But either the Watch Tower Society conceals the real facts about 

these two tablets, or they have done very poor research on the 

matter. The first tablet, designated "A. 124" by Thompson in his 

Catalogue from 1927, is not dated in the accession-year of Xerxes 

(486/485), as Thompson indicated. This was a copying error by 

Thompson. The tablet is actually dated in the first year of Xerxes 

(485/484 BC). This was pointed out as far back as in 1941 by 

George G. Cameron in The American Journal of Semitic Languages and 

Literature, Vol. LVIII, p. 320, ftn. 33. Thus there was no 

"overlapping" of the two reigns. 

The second tablet, "VAT 4397", published as No. 634 by M. San 

Nicolo and A. Ungnad in their work from 1934, was dated by them 

to the fifth month ("Ab"). It should be noted, however, that the 

authors put a question mark after the month name. The sign of the 

month on the tablet is damaged and may be reconstructed in 

several ways. In the more recent work by Parker and Dubberstein, 

Babylonian Chronology, published in 1956, where the same tablet is 

designated "VAS VI 177", the authors point out that the tablet "has 

the month sign damaged. It might be IX [9] but more probably is 

XII [12]." (Page 17) The original guess by Nicolo and Ungnad is


dropped altogether. As Darius died in the 7th month, a tablet 

dated to the 9th or 12th month in the accession-year of his 

successor is quite all right. There was no overlapping between the 

two reigns. 

2. The flight of Themistocles 

Much has been made in the Watch Tower publications of 

Themistocles’ flight to Persia. This argument is an old one, 

originating with the Jesuit theologian Denis Petau (Petavius) and 

archbishop James Ussher in the seventeenth century. It was 

presented in great detail by E. W. Hengstenberg in his work 

Christologie des Alten Testaments, published in Berlin in 1832. 

According to the Greek historians Thycudides and Charon of 

Lampsacus, 

Artaxerxes was the king that Themistocles spoke with after his 

arrival in Persia. The Watch Tower Society argues that 

Themistocles died about 471/70 BC. Artaxerxes, therefore, must 

have began his rule before that date and not as late as in 465 BC. 

(Insight 2, p. 614) These arguments have a superficial strength, only 

because the Watch Tower Society leaves out some very important 

information. In proof of their claim that Themistocles met 

Artaxerxes after his arrival in Persia, they quote Plutarch’s 

information that "Thucydides and Charon of Lampsacus relate that 

Xerxes was dead, and that it was his son Artaxerxes with whom 

Themistocles had his interview". But they left out the second part 

of Plutarch's statement, which says: 

. . . but Ephorus and Dinon and Clitarchus and Heracleides and 

yet more besides have it that it was Xerxes to whom he came. 

With the chronological data Thucydides seems to me more in 

accord, although these are by no means securely established. 

The Watch Tower Society, then, conceals that Plutarch goes on to 

say that a number of ancient historians had written about this 

event, and that most of them stated that Xerxes, not Artaxerxes, 

was on the throne when Themistocles came to Persia. Although 

Plutarch (c 46–120 A.D.) felt that Thucydides was more reliable, he 

stresses that the chronological data were by no means securely 

established. One fact that usually seems to be ignored is that 

Thucydides wrote his story about Themistocles’ flight some time 

after 406 BC, or about two generations after the event. He


contradicts himself several times in this narrative, which shows 

that his information on the subject cannot be trusted. (On this, see 

the Cambridge Ancient History, V, 1992, p. 14.) 

But even if Themistocles really may have met Artaxerxes, there is 

nothing to show that this occurred in the 470’s. There is no 

evidence whatsoever in support of the claim that Themistocles died 

in 471/70 BC. None of the sources referred to by the Society says 

so, and some of them, including Plutarch, clearly show that he died 

much later, in about 459 BC. (Plutarch's Lives, XXXI:2–5) A 

considerable time passed after the attempt to defame Themistocles 

in Athens in the archonship of Praxiergus (471/70 BC) until his 

interview with Artaxerxes (or Xerxes). It took several attempts 

before the enemies of Themistocles succeeded and forced him to 

flee, first from Athens and finally from Greece. Cambridge Ancient 

History (Vol. 5, pp. 62ff.) dates this flight to 569 BC. He first fled to 

some friends in Asia Minor, where he stayed for some time. The 

Society quotes Diodorus Siculus in support of the 471/70 date for 

the beginning of the defamation of Themistocles, but avoids to 

mention Diodorus’ statement that, on Themistocles’ arrival in Asia 

Minor, Xerxes was still on the throne in Persia! (Diodorus Siculus, 

XI:54–59) This, of course, conflicts with Thucydides’ statement 

that Themistocles’ letter from Asia Minor was sent to Artaxerxes. 

After some time, evidently after some years, in Asia Minor, 

Themistocles finally went to Persia. There he first spent one year 

studying the language before his meeting with the king. This 

meeting may have occured toward the end of 465 BC or early in 

464 BC. As historian A. T. Olmstead argues, Xerxes may very well 

have been on the throne when Themistocles arrived in Persia, but 

may have died shortly afterwards, so that Themistocles, after his 

year of learning the language, met Artaxerxes. In this way the 

conflicting statements by the ancient historians may at least 

partially be harmonized. 

After his meeting with the Persian king, Themistocles settled in the 

city of Magnesia, where he lived on for some years before he died. 

(Plutarch's Lives, XXXI:2–5) It is completely impossible, therefore, 

to date his death to 471/70 BC, as done by the Watch Tower 

Society. 

3. The two tablets dated to years ”50” and ”51” of 

Artaxerxes


In support of the claim that Artaxerxes ruled for 51 years instead 

of 41, the Watch Tower Society refers to two tablets dated to his 

”50 th ” year and ”51 st ” year, respectively. The first tablet, listed as 

BM 65494 in E. Leichty and A.K. Grayson, Catalogue of the 

Babylonian Tablets in the British Museum, Vol. VII (London, 1987), is 

still unpublished. The second tablet, CBM 12803 (= BE 8/1, 127), 

on the other hand, was published in 1908 by Albert T. Clay in The 

Babylonian Expedition of the University of Pennsylvania, Series A: 

Cuneiform Texts, Vol. VIII, text 127. All authorities on Achaemenid 

history agree that both of these cuneiform tablets contain scribal 

errors. 

As the Watch Tower Society points out, the tablet published by 

Albert Clay is double-dated. The date on the tablet is given as, 

”51st year, accession year, 12th month, day 20, Darius, king of 

lands.” (Insight, p. 616) This text, then, seems to equate the 51st 

year (evidently of Artaxerxes I; the name is not given in the text) 

with the accession-year of his successor Darius II. 

But once again, the Watch Tower Society does not tell the whole 

truth. The reason is, that the whole truth changes the picture 

completely. Many dated tablets are extant from the end of 

Artaxerxes’ reign, thanks to the discovery of a cuneiform archive 

from the Murashu firm. In Istanbul Murashu Texts (Istanbul, 1997), 

V. Donbaz and M. W. Stolper explain that the Murashu archive is 

”the largest available documentary source for Achaemenid 

Babylonia in the years between Xerxes and Alexander.” (Page 4) 

Nearly all of the tablets are dated to the reigns of Artaxerxes I and 

his successor Darius II. The number culminates in the last two 

years of the reign of Artaxerxes and the first seven years of the 

reign of Darius II, as shown by the graph below, published by 

Donbaz and Stolper on page 6 of the work quoted above. The 

archive includes over 60 texts from the 41st year of Artaxerxes and 

the accession year of Darius II, and culminates with about 120 

texts dated to the 1st year of Darius II!


All Murashu texts with preserved years; numbers of texts by year. 

As shown by the ancient Greek historians, the months following 

upon the death of Artaxerxes was a chaotic period. His son and 

successor Xerxes II was murdered by his brother Sogdianus after 

only a few weeks of reign. The usurper Sogdianus then held the 

throne for about seven months, after which he was killed by Darius 

II in February, 423 BC. But as Sogdianus was never acknowledged 

as the legitimate king, the scribes continued to date their texts to 

the reign of Artaxerxes for some months after his death. It is even 

possible that Artaxerxes died toward the end of his 40 th year, as 

some scholars argue, so that the scribes had to extend his reign 

artificially to include a 41 st year. This is still a question debated 

among scholars. 

Not until Darius II ascended to the throne in the 11th Babylonian 

month (corresponding to parts of February and March, 423 BCE) 

did the scribes begin to date the texts to his reign also. But to avoid 

any confusion, the scribes usually double-dated the texts, 

mentioning both the 41 st year [of Artaxerxes] and the accessionyear 

of Darius II. They did this, because it was important for them 

to keep an exact chronological count of the reigns, as this was their 

calendar and the ”era” by which they dated various events, such as 

political events, astronomical observations, and economic 

transactions. 

A number of such double-dated tablets have been discovered. F. X. 

Kugler, on page 396 of his Sternkunde und Stemdienst in Babel, II. 

Buch, II. Teil, Heft 2 (Munster 1924), presented the chronological 

information on four of these tablets. Other tablets of this kind


have been found since. Ten such double-dated tablets are now 

known, of which all except one equate ”year 41”, evidently of 

Artaxerxes I, with the ”accession-year of Darius.” The exception is 

CBM 12803, the text that has year ”51” instead of ”41”. And all 

except one (BM 33342) of these ten texts belong to the Murashu 

archive. The nine texts double-dated to ”year 41, accession-year of 

Darius” are: 

BM 54557: (= Zawadzki JEOL 34:45f.) Text from Sippar [?]. 

Although dated only to the accession-year of Darius II (month IX[?], 

day 29), the body of the text refers to a span of time “from month V 

year 41 of Ar(takshatsu ... ) to the end of month XII, year 41, 

accession of Darius.” (Information on this text was received from 

Prof. Matthew W. Stolper, the leading expert on the Murashu archive, 

in a letter dated January 29, 1999). 

Bertin 2889: Text from Babylon dated to ”day 26, month XI, year 

41, accession-year of Darius.” The text is not published, but 

information on the date was received by Jean-Frédéric Brunet from 

Dr. Francis Joannès on July 3 rd , 2003. (Mail Brunet-Jonsson, 

December 22, 2003) 

BM 33342: Text from Babylon dated to “month Shabatu [month 

XI]; day 29; year 41, accession-year, Darius, King of Lands.” 

(Matthew W. Stolper in AMI, Vol. 16, 1983, pp. 231–236) This text 

does not belong to the Murashu archive. 

BE 10 no. 4: (= TuM 2/3, 216) Text from Nippur dated to day 14, 

month XII, year 41, accession-year of Darius II, king of the lands. 

BE 10 no. 5: Text from Nippur dated to day 17, month XII, 

accession-year of Darius, king of the lands. The first line says “until 

the end of Adar (month XII) of year 41, accession-year of Darius, 

king of the lands.” 

BE 10 no. 6: Text from Nippur dated to the accession-year of 

Darius. Month and day are illegible, but lines 2f. mention the whole 

year “from the first month of year 41 to the end of month XII of the 

accession-year of Darius.” 

PBS 2/1 no. 1: Text from Nippur dated to day 22, month XII, year 

41, accession-year of Darius II. 

BE 10 no. 7: (= TuM 2/3, 181) Text from Nippur dated to month 

I, day 2, year 1, of Darius II. Line 6 mentions receipt for produce for, 

“year 41, accession-year of Darius.” 

PBS 2/1 no. 3: Text from Nippur dated to month I, day 5, year 1, 

of Darius II. Lines 2–3 refers to taxes for the period “up to the end 

of month XII, year (4)1, (ac)cession year of Darius.” Line 13 says: 

“until the end of Adar [month XII], year 41.”


Explanation of abbreviations used in the list: 

AMI: Archaologische Mitteilungen aus Iran. 

BE: The Babylonian Expedition of the University of Pennsylvania, Series A: Cuneiform Texts, 

ed. by H. V. Hilprecht (Philadelphia, 1893–1914). Vols. 1–6 edited by Albert T. Clay in 1904. 

Bertin: G. Bertin, Corpus of Babylonian Terra-Cotta Tablets. Principally Contracts, Vols. I– 

VI (London, 1883). Unpublished. 

BM: British Museum. 

JEOL: Jaarbericht van het Vooraziatisch-Egyptisch Genootschap “Ex Oriente Lux”. 

PBS: Pennsylvania. University. University Museum. Publications of the Babylonian Section 

(Philadelphia, 1911 – ). The first two volumes were edited by Albert T. Clay. 

TuM: Texte und Materialien der Frau Professor Hilprecht Collection of Babylonian 

Antiquities im Eigentum der Universität Jena (Leipzig).


All these nine texts agree in showing that Darius II acceded to the 

throne in the 41st year of his predecessor. The tablets clearly show 

that Artaxerxes I cannot have ruled for more than 41 years. As 

stated above, the text published by Albert Clay in 1908, the only 

one quoted by the Watch Tower Society, belongs to the same 

category of doubled-dated texts as those quoted above, the only 

difference being that it gives the predecessor of Darius a reign of 

51 years instead of 41. It is quite clear that the number ”51” on that 

tablet contains a scribal error. This is the only reasonable 

conclusion to draw, as the only alternative is to claim that the 

figure ”41” on all the other nine tablets listed above are errors. 

It is difficult to believe that the Watch Tower Society’s writers were 

completely ignorant of the existence of several double-dated tablets 

from the accession-year of Darius. To quote only the two tablets 

with scribal errors (years ”50” and ”51”) and keep silent about all 

the double-dated texts that equate Darius’ accession-year with year 

”41” of his predecessor is far from honest. 

Albert T. Clay, who published the tablet with the erroneous figure 

”51” on it, was well aware that it was a scribal error. To the right of 

the erroneous figure in his published copy of the text he pointed 

out that ”51” was a ”mistake for 41”: 

Tablet ”CBM 12803”, published by Albert T. Clay as 

No. 127 in The Babylonian Expedition of the 

University of Pennsylvania, Series A: Cuneiform 

Texts, Vol. VIII (Philadelphia, 1908), P1. 57.


Such an error was easy to make, as the difference between ”41” 

and ”51” in cuneiform is just a small wedge—one touch with the 

stylus. Such errors are not unusual. The text with the figure ”50” 

instead of ”40” is just another example of the same kind of error. 

Professor Matthew W. Stolper explains: 

Yes, it is quite an easy error. As you may know, the sign that 

indicates ”year” before the numeral ends with four closely spaced 

angle-wedges. The digit ”40” in ”41” is represented by four more 

closely spaced angle-wedges, in slightly different configuration. It 

would take a simple slip of the stylus to add the extra wedge. – 

Letter Stolper-Jonsson, January 29, 1999. 

Artaxerxes’ reign astronomically fixed 

The decisive evidence for the length of Artaxerxes’ rule is the 

astronomical information found on a number of tablets dated to 

his reign. One such text is the astronomical "diary" "VAT 5047", 

clearly dated to the 11th year of Artaxerxes. Although the text is 

damaged, it preserves information about two lunar positions 

relative to planets and the positions of Mercury, Jupiter, Venus and 

Saturn. This information suffices to identify the date of the text as 

454 B.C. As this was the 11th year of Artaxerxes, the preceding 

year, 455 BC, cannot have been his 20th year as the Watch Tower 

Society claims, but his 10th year. His 20th year, then,must have 

been 445/44 BC. (See Sachs/Hunger, Astronomical Diaries and 

Related Texts from Babylonia, Vol. 1, Wien 1988, pp. 56–59.) 

There are also some tablets dated to the 21st and last year of 

Xerxes. One of them, BM 32234, which is dated to day 14 or 18 of 

the 5th month of Xerxes’ 21st year, belongs to the group of 

astronomical texts called "18-year texts" or "Saros texts". The 

astronomical information preserved on this tablet fixes it to the 

year 465 BC. The text includes the following interesting 

information: "Month V 14 (+x) Xerxes was murdered by his son." This 

text alone not only shows that Xerxes ruled for 21 year, but also 

that his last year was 465 BC, not 475 as the Society holds! 

There are several "Saros texts" of this type covering the reigns of 

Xerxes and Artaxerxes. The many detailed and dated descriptions 

of lunar eclipses from different years of their reigns establish the 

chronology of this period as an absolute chronology.


Two other astronomical tablets from the reigns of Xerxes and 

Artaxerxes, BM 45674 and BM 32299, contain dated observations 

of the planet Venus. Again, these observations establish the 

chronology of this period as an absolute chronology. 

Thus we have numerous astronomical observations dated to 

different parts of the reigns of Xerxes and Axtaxerxes preserved on 

cuneiform tablets. In many cases, only one or two of these 

observations would suffice to establish the beginning and end of 

their reigns. The total number of astronomical observations dated 

to their reigns, however, are about 40 or more. It is impossible, 

therefore, to change their reigns even one year! The Society’s dating of 

Artaxerxes’ 20th year to 455 BC is demonstrably wrong. This, of 

course, also proves that their interpretation of the 70 weeks of 

Daniel is wrong. 

The seventy weeks of Daniel 

A number of applications of the 70 weeks of Daniel have appeared 

throughout the centuries. Some of them, including that of the 

Watch Tower Society, have to be discarded at once, as they can be 

shown to be in direct conflict with historically established dates. 

They have nothing to do with reality. 

If Artaxerxes’ 20th year was 445/44 instead of 455, it is still 

possible to start from that year, provided that we use a "prophetical 

year" of 360 days instead of the solar year of 365,2422 days. This 

was demonstrated by Sir Robert Anderson in his book The Coming 

Prince (first published in 1895). His application has recently been 

improved upon by H. W. Hoehner in his book Chronological Aspects 

of the Life of Christ (1977), pages 135ff. These authors show that the 

476 years from Artaxerxes’ 20th year, 445/44 BC, to the death of 

Christ ( if set at 33 A.D.) correspond to 483 years of 360 days. 

(476x365,2422 is 173.855 days, and if this number is divided by 360 

we get 483 years.) This is just one example of an application that at 

least has the advantage of a historically established date at its start. 

There is, of course, much more that can and should be said about 

this subject. On the preceding pages I have just tried to summarize 

a few of the more important observations. Now and then members 

of Jehovah’s Witnesses and others have written to me about this 

problem, and maybe this summary can be of some benefit to 

others, too, who are asking about the matter. In the future I hope 

to find time for writing a more detailed discussion on the subject.

PROFESSOR ROBERT R. NEWTON, “PTOLEMY’S 

CANON,” AND “THE CRIME OF CLAUDIUS PTOLEMY” 

The following material is adapted from the discussion on pages 44– 

48 of the first and second editions of my book, The Gentile Times 

Reconsidered (published in 1983 and 1986), with some updates and 

additions. 

PROFESSOR ROBERT R. NEWTON (who died in 1991) was a 

noted physicist who has published a series of outstanding works on 

the secular accelerations of the moon and the earth. He examined 

in detail hundreds of astronomical observations dating all the way 

from the present back to about 700 BC, in order to determine the 

rate of the slowly changing of the length of the day during this 

period. The best information on his research in this area is found in 

his book, The Moon’s Acceleration and Its Physical Origins, vol. 1, 

published in 1979. His results have more recently been further 

refined by other scholars, in particular by F. Richard Stephenson. 

(Historical Eclipses and Earth’s Rotation, Cambridge: Cambridge 

University Press, 1997) 

Accusations against Claudius Ptolemy not new 

The claim that Claudius Ptolemy ”deliberately fabricated” many of 

his observations is not new. Astronomers have questioned 

Ptolemy’s observations for centuries. As early as 1008 AD ibn 

Yunis concluded that they contained serious errors, and by about 

1800 astronomers had recognized that almost all of Ptolemy’s 

observations were in error. In 1817, Delambre asked: ”Did 

Ptolemy do any observing? Are not the observations that he claims 

to have made merely computations from his tables, and examples 

to help in explaining his theories?” – J.B.J. Delambre, Histoire de 

l’Astronomie Ancienne, Paris 1817, Vol. II, p. XXV; as quoted by 

Robert R. Newton in The Moon’s Acceleration and Its Physical Origins 

[MAPO], Vol. I, (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins 

University Press, 1979), p. 43. 

Two years later (in 1819) Delambre also concluded that Ptolemy 

fabricated some of his solar observations and demonstrated how 

the fabrication was made. (Newton, MAPO I, p. 44) More recently, 

other astronomers have re-examined Ptolemy’s observations and 

arrived at similar results. One of them is Professor Robert R. 

Newton. In his book, The Crime of Claudius Ptolemy (Baltimore and 

London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1977), Newton 

claims that Ptolemy fudged, not only a large body of the 

394

“Ptolemy’s Canon ” 395 

observations he says he had made himself, but also a number of 

the observations Ptolemy attributes to other astronomers, including 

some he quotes from Babylonian sources. These include the three 

oldest observations recorded in Ptolemy’s Almagest dating from the 

first and second years of the Babylonian king Merodach-baladan 

(called Mardokempados in Almagest), corresponding to 721 and 720 

BC. 

Scholars disagreeing with R.R. Newton 

In the ensuing debate a number of scholars have repudiated 

Newton’s conclusions. They have argued that Newton’s arguments 

”are marred by all manner of distortions” (Bernard R. Goldstein of 

the University of Pittsburgh in Science, February 24, 1978, p. 872), 

and that his case collapses because ”it is based on faulty statistical 

analysis and a disregard for the methods of early astronomy” 

(scholars Noel M. Swerdlow of the University of Chicago, Victor 

E. Thoren of Indiana University, and Owen J. Gingerich of 

Harvard University, in Scientific American, March 1979, p. 93, 

American edition). Similar comments are made by Noel M. 

Swerdlow, ”Ptolemy on Trial, ” in The American Scholar, Autumn 

1979, pp. 523–531, and by Julia Neuffer, ”´Ptolemy’s Canon´ 

Debunked?” in Andrews University Seminary Studies, Vol. XVII, No. 1, 

1979, pp. 39–46. An article by Owen J. Gingerich with a rebuttal by 

R.R. Newton is found in the Quarterly Journal of the Royal Astronomical 

Society, Vol. 21, 1980, pp. 253–266, 388–399, with a final response 

by Gingerich in Vol. 22, 1981, pp. 40–44. 

Scholarly support for R.R. Newton 

Most of these critics, though, are historians without particular 

expertise in the field of Greek astronomy. Some reviews written by 

well-informed astronomers have been favorable to Newton’s 

conclusions. One historian who is also well acquainted with Greek 

astronomy, K.P. Moesgaard, agrees that Ptolemy fabricated his 

astronomical data, though he feels it was done for some honest 

reason. (K.P. Moesgaard, ”Ptolemy’s Failings,” Journal for the History 

of Astronomy, Vol. XI, 1980, pp. 133–135) Rolf Brahde, too, wrote a 

favorable review of Newton’s book in Astronomisk Tidskrift, 1979, 

No. 1, pp. 42,43. 

B.L. van der Waerden, Professor of Mathematics and an expert 

on Greek astronomy, discusses Newton’s claims in his book, Die 

Astronomie der Griechen (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche 

Buchgesellschaft, 1988). Although he would not go as far as


Newton in his attack on Ptolemy, he agrees that Ptolemy falsified 

his observations, stating: ”That Ptolemy systematically and 

intentionally has falsified his observations in order to bring his 

observational results in agreement with his theory have been 

convincingly demonstrated by Delambre and Newton.” (p. 253) 

Recent criticism of R.R. Newton 

G.J. Toomer, the well-known translator of Ptolemy’s Almagest 

(London: Gerald Duckworth & Co., 1984), discusses Newton’s 

claim in an article published in 1988 (”Hipparchus and Babylonian 

Astronomy,” in A Scientific Humanist. Studies in Memory of Abraham 

Sachs, eds. E. Leichty, M. DeJ. Ellis, & P. Gerardi, Philadelphia, 

1988, pp. 353–362), in which he convincingly argues that all the 

observations from earlier periods recorded by Ptolemy were taken 

over from the Greek mathematician Hipparchus (2 nd century BC). 

In 1990, Dr. Gerd Grasshoff included a lengthy section on the 

accusations against Claudius Ptolemy in his work, The History of 

Ptolemy’s Star Catalogue (London, Paris, Tokyo, Hong Kong: 

Springer-Verlag, 1990, pp. 79–91). He concludes that Newton’s 

arguments against Ptolemy are ”superficial” and ”unjustified”. 

More recently, Oscar Sheynin has discussed Newton’s 

accusations at some length, arguing that the reason why Ptolemy’s 

observations so well agree with his theory is, not that he fabricated 

them, but that he selected the observations that best fitted his theory. 

Although such selectivity is not allowed in science today, it was 

quite common in ancient times. For this reason Sheynin states that 

Ptolemy cannot be regarded a fraud. – O. Sheynin, ”The Treatment 

of Observations in Early Astronomy,” in C. Truesdell (ed.), Archive 

for History of Exact Sciences, Vol. 46:2, 1993, pp. 153–192. 

In summary, there seems to be at least some evidence in 

support of the claims that Claudius Ptolemy was ”fraudulent” in 

the way he handled his observations, either by ”trimming” the 

values or by selecting those who best fitted his theory. However, 

few scholars would go as far as R. R. Newton, who dismisses 

Ptolemy altogether as a fraud. As Dr. James Evans notes, ”very few 

historians of astronomy have accepted Newton’s conclusions in 

their entirety.” – Journal for the History of Astronomy, Vol. 24, Parts ½, 

February/May, 1993, pp. 145–146. 

R.R. Newton and ”Ptolemy’s Canon” 

In a review of Newton’s book, The Crime of Claudius Ptolemy, 

published in Scientific American of October 1977, pp. 79–81, it was


stated that ”Ptolemy’s forgery may have extended to inventing the 

length of reigns of Babylonian kings.” This was a reference to the 

so-called ”Ptolemy’s Canon”, which Newton at that time 

erroneously believed had been composed by Claudius Ptolemy 

himself and thus may have been affected by his ”forgery”. The 

statement was quickly picked up and published in The Watchtower 

magazine (December 15, 1977, p. 747). On page 375 of his The 

Crime of Claudius Ptolemy, Newton also wrote: ”It follows that 

Ptolemy’s king list is useless in the study of chronology, and that it 

must be ignored. What is worse, much Babylonian chronology is 

based upon Ptolemy’s king list. All relevant chronology must now 

be reviewed and all dependence upon Ptolemy’s list must be 

removed.” 

Newton was unaware of the fact that ”Ptolemy’s Canon” was 

not composed by Claudius Ptolemy. He was not an historian and 

he was not an expert on Babylonian chronology. He also admits in 

his work that he has not studied sources other than Ptolemy for the 

years prior to Nebuchadnezzar. (The Crime of Claudius Ptolemy, p. 

375) He explains that his thoughts on the relations between 

chronology and the work of Claudius Ptolemy were influenced by a 

Mr. Philip G. Couture of Santee, California. In the Preface of his 

book he states: ”I thank Mr. Philip G. Couture of Santee, 

California for correspondence which led me to understand some of 

the relations between chronology and the work of Ptolemy.” (The 

Crime of Claudius Ptolemy, p. XIV) The same Mr. Couture also 

induced Dr. Newton to reject the Assyrian eponym canon in his 

work, The Moon’s Acceleration and Its Physical Origins. (See Vol. 1, 

1979, p. 189) 

What Newton probably did not know was that Mr. Couture was 

and still is one of Jehovah’s Witnesses, and that some of the 

chronological arguments he passed on to Newton were taken from 

the Watch Tower Society’s Bible dictionary, Aid to Bible 

Understanding. These arguments were not only aimed at supporting 

the chronology of the Watch Tower Society, but they are also 

demonstrably untenable! 

Correspondence with R. R. Newton 

In 1978, the year after The Crime of Claudius Ptolemy had been 

published, I had some correspondence with Professor Newton. In 

a letter dated June 27, 1978, I sent him a shorter study I had 

prepared in which the so-called ”Ptolemy’s Canon” was compared 

with earlier cuneiform sources. This study briefly demostrated that


all the reigns of the Babylonian kings given in the Canon, from 

Nabonassar (747–734 BC) to Nabonidus (555–539 BC), were in 

complete agreement with these older sources. (This study was later 

expanded and published in a British journal for interdisciplinarty 

studies, the British forum for the discussion of the catastrophe 

theories of Immanuel Velikovsky and others: Chronology & 

Catastrophism Review, Vol. IX, 1987, pp. 14–23.) I asked Professor 

Newton: ”How is it possible that Ptolemy’s astronomical data are 

wrong, and yet the king list, to which they are attached, is correct?” 

In his answer, dated August 11, 1978, Newton said: ”I am not 

ready to be convinced that Ptolemy’s king list is accurate before 

Nabopolassar [= before 625 BC], although I have high confidence 

that it is rather accurate for Nabopolassar and later kings.” He also 

pointed out: ”The basic point is that Ptolemy calculated the 

circumstances of the eclipses in the Syntaxis from his theories, and 

he then pretended that his calculated values were values that had 

been observed in Babylon. His theories are accurate enough to give the 

correct day of an eclipse, but he missed the hour and the magnitude.” 

Thus Ptolemy’s ”adjustments” of the eclipse observations were 

too small to affect the year, the month, and the day of an eclipse. 

Only the hour and the magnitude were affected. Ptolemy’s 

supposed ”adjustments” of the records of the ancient Babylonian 

eclipses, then, didn’t change the BCE dates that had been 

established for these observations. They did not change the chronology! 

Further, Professor Newton was convinced that the king list was 

accurate from Nabopolassar and onwards. In other words, he was 

convinced that the whole Neo-Babylonian chronology from Nabopolassar 

through Nabonidus (625–539 BC) was accurate! Why? 

The reason was that Newton had made a very thorough study 

of some of the ancient Babylonian astronomical records that were 

independent of ”Ptolemy’s Canon”, including the two astronomical 

cuneiform texts designated VAT 4956 and Strm. Kambys. 400. 

From his examination of these two records, he had established that 

the first text referred to the year 568/67 BC and the second one to 

523 BC. He concluded: ”Thus we have quite strong confirmation 

that Ptolemy’s list is correct for Nebuchadrezzar, and reasonable 

confirmation for Kambyses.” (The Crime of Claudius Ptolemy, 1977, p. 

375) These findings were further emphasized in his next work, The 

Moon’s Acceleration and Its Physical Origins, vol. 1, published in 1979, 

where he concludes on page 49: ”Nebuchadrezzar’s first year


therefore began in –603 [= 604 BC], and this agrees with Ptolemy’s 

list.” 

Therefore, to quote some statements by R. R. Newton in an 

attempt to undermine the chronology established for the Neo- 

Babylonian era would be to quote him out of context. It would be 

to misrepresent his views and conceal his conclusions. It would be 

fraudulent. Yet, this has been repeatedly done by the Watch Tower 

Society and some defenders of its chronology. But Newton’s 

findings refute their chronology and prove it to be false. 

Summary 

Whether Ptolemy falsified his observations, perhaps also some of 

those of earlier astronomers, is irrelevant for the study of the Neo- 

Babylonian chronology. Today, this chronology is not based upon the 

observations recorded by Ptolemy in his Almagest. 

Further, the claim that Ptolemy may have ”invented” the lengths 

of reign in ”Ptolemy’s Canon” is based upon the erroneous view 

that this king list was composed by Claudius Ptolemy. As is 

demonstrated on pages 94–96 of the third edition of The Gentile 

Times Reconsidered (and also briefly in the second edition), the 

designation ”Ptolemy’s Canon” is ”a misnomer” (Otto Neugebauer), 

as this king list according to Eduard Meyer, Franz X. Kugler and 

others had been in use among Alexandrian astronomers for 

centuries before the time of Claudius Ptolemy, and had been 

inherited and brought up-to-date from one generation of scholars 

to next. 

Finally, the claim that this king list today is the basis of or principal 

source for the Neo-Babylonian chronology, is false. Those who make 

such a claim are either ignorant or dishonest. The plain truth is that 

the king list is not needed today for fixing the chronology of this 

era, although its figures for the reigns of the Neo-Babylonian kings 

are upheld by at least 14 lines of independent evidence based on 

cuneiform documents, as is demonstrated in The Gentile Times 

Reconsided. 

Addition in 2003: 

Modern scholars who have examined the so-called Ptolemy’s 

Canon (more correctly called the ”Royal Canon”) in detail agree 

that the kinglist has proved to be reliable from beginning to end. 

This is emphasized, for example, by Dr Leo Depuydt in his article, 

”More Valuable than all Gold: Ptolemy’s Royal Canon and 

Babylonian Chronology,” published in Journal of Cuneiform Studies,


Vol. 47, 1995, pp. 97–117. Quite recently, Leo Depuydt has written 

another article in which he discusses the reliability of Ptolemy’s 

Canon, "The Shifting Foundation of Ancient Chronology," soon to 

be published in Acts of European Association of Archaeologists, Meeting 

VIII.

A REVIEW OF: 

ROLF FURULI: PERSIAN CHRONOLOGY AND 

THE LENGTH OF THE BABYLONIAN EXILE OF 

THE JEWS 

(OSLO: ROLF FURULI A/S, 2003) 

Persian Chronology and the Length of the Babylonian Exile of the Jews is the first of 

two volumes in which Rolf Furuli attempts to revise the traditional chronology 

for the Neo-Babylonian and Persian periods. Furuli states that the reason for 

this venture is that this chronology is in conflict with the Bible. He insists that 

the Bible “unambiguously,” “explicitly,” and “definitely” shows that Jerusalem 

and the land of Judah were desolate for 70 years, until the Jewish exiles in 

Babylon returned to Judah as a result of the decree Cyrus issued in his first 

regnal year, 538/37 BCE (pp. 17, 89, 91). This implies that the desolation of 

Jerusalem in Nebuchadnezzar’s 18th regnal year took place 70 years earlier, in 

607 BCE, contrary to modern historical research, which has fixed the 18th year 

of Nebuchadnezzar in 587/86 BCE, a date that also agrees with the chronology 

of the ancient kinglist known as “Ptolemy’s Canon.” Furuli does not explicitly 

mention the 607 BCE date in this volume, perhaps because a more detailed 

discussion of the Neo-Babylonian chronology is reserved for his not-yetpublished 

second volume. 

Most chapters in this first volume, therefore, contain a critical examination 

of the reigns of the Persian kings from Cyrus to Darius II. The principal claim 

of this discussion is that the first year of Artaxerxes I should be moved 10 years 

backward, from 464 to 474 BCE. Furuli does not mention that this is an old 

idea that can be traced back to the noted Jesuit theologian Denis Petau, better 

known as Dionysius Petavius, who first presented it in a work published in 

1627. Petavius’ revision had a theological basis, because, if the “seventy weeks 

[of years],” or 490 years, of Daniel 9:24-27 are to be counted from the 20th 

regnal year of Artaxerxes (Neh. 2:1ff.) to 36 CE (his date for the end of the 

period), Artaxerxes’ 20th year must be moved from 445 back to 455 BCE. 

Furuli says nothing about this underlying motive for his proposed revision. 

Introduction: 

The hidden agenda 

Furuli published this book at his own expense. Who is he? On the back 

cover of the book he presents himself this way: 

Rolf Furuli is a lecturer in Semitic languages at the University of Oslo. He is 

working on a doctoral thesis which suggests a new understanding of the verbal 

system of Classical Hebrew. He has for many years worked with translation 

theory, and has published two books on Bible translation; he also has 

experience as a translator. The present volume is a result of his study of the 

401


chronology of the Ancient world for more than two decades. 

What Furuli does not mention is that he is a Jehovah’s Witness, and that for 

a long time he has produced apologetic texts defending Watchtower exegesis 

against criticism. His two books on Bible translation are nothing more than 

defenses of the Witnesses’ New World Translation of the Bible. He fraudulently 

fails to mention that for decades he has tried to defend Watchtower chronology 

and that his revised chronology is essentially a defense of the Watchtower 

Society’s traditional chronology. He describes his chronology as “a new 

chronology,” which he calls “the Oslo Chronology,” (p. 14) when in fact the 

607 BCE date for the destruction of Jerusalem is the chronological foundation 

for the claims and apocalyptic messages of the Watchtower organization, and 

the 455 BCE date for the 20th year of Artaxerxes I is its traditional starting 

point for its calculation of the “seventy weeks” of Daniel 9:24-27. 

Despite these facts, Furuli nowhere mentions the Watchtower Society or its 

chronology. Nor does he mention my detailed refutation of this chronology in 

various editions of my book The Gentile Times Reconsidered (GTR; 3rd edition, 

Atlanta: Commentary Press, 1998; 1st ed. published in 1983), despite the fact 

that in circulated “organized collections of notes” he has tried to refute the 

conclusions presented in its earlier editions. (A fourth revised and updated 

edition of GTR has been prepared and will be published in 2004.) Furuli’s 

silence on GTR is noteworthy because he discusses R. E. Winkle’s 1987 study 

which presents mostly the same arguments and conclusions as are found in the 

first edition of GTR (1983). As a Jehovah’s Witness, Furuli is forbidden to 

interact with former members of his organization. If this is the reason for his 

feigned ignorance of my study, he is acting as a loyal Witness—not as a scholar. 

Clearly, Furuli has an agenda, and he is hiding it. 

The contents of the first four chapters 

Chapter 1: Pages 17-37: 

In Chapter 1, Furuli claims that the Bible and the astronomical tablets VAT 

4956 and Strm Kambys 400 “contradict each other” (pp. 17-28), and he 

therefore questions the reliability of astronomical tablets by describing nine 

“potential sources of error.” (pp. 28-37) 


In Chapter 2, Furuli claims that the “most acute problem for making an 

absolute chronology based on astronomical tablets” is that many, “perhaps 

most positions of the heavenly bodies on such tablets, are calculated rather than 

observed.” (p. 15) 


In Chapter 3, Furuli makes some general comments on the Sumerian, 

Akkadian, and Hebrew languages and describes some “pitfalls” in reading and 

translating the ancient documents.

Furuli’s First Book 403 


In Chapter 4, Furuli presents his views on “the chronological accounts of 

Claudius Ptolemy” and of those of some other ancient authors (pp. 66-74), 

then discusses the 70-year prophecy of Jeremiah. (pp. 75-92) 

In the material that follows (Part One of this review; Parts Two and Three will 

be published at a later date), I critically examine the argumentation of these four 

chapters. 

Acknowledgements are made to a number of scholars and knowledgeable 

colleagues for their assistance in preparing this review. I choose not to mention 

any names, as some of them, for various reasons, need to remain anonymous. I 

am indebted to all of them for their observations, suggestions, criticism, and, in 

particular, for the professional help given by two of them with proof-reading 

and polishing my English and grammar. 

For some works often referred to in the discussion below the following 

abbreviations are used: 

ADT Abraham J. Sachs and Hermann Hunger, Astronomical Diaries and Related 

Texts from Babylonia (Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der 

Wissenschaften. Vol. I – 1988, II – 1989, III – 1996, V – 2001). 

CBT Erle Leichty et al, Catalogue of the Babylonian Tablets in the British Museum, 

Vols. 6, 7, and 8 (1986, 1987, and 1988). These volumes list the tablets from 

Sippar held at BM. 

GTR 4 Carl Olof Jonsson, The Gentile Times Reconsidered, 4 th ed. (Atlanta: 

Commentary Press, 2004). 

LBAT Abraham J. Sachs (ed.), Late Babylonian Astronomical and Related Texts. 

Copied by T. G. Pinches and J. N. Strassmaier (Providence, Rhode Island: Brown 

University Press, 1955). 

PD Richard A. Parker and Waldo H. Dubberstein, Babylonian Chronology 626 

B.C.—A.D. 75 (Providence, Rhode Island: Brown University Press, 1956).


Chapter I - “Fundamental Chronological Considerations” 

Only “three principal sources” for the Neo-Babylonian and Persian 

chronology? 

One of Furuli’s main goals appears to be to convince his readers that there 

are only three principal sources on which the chronology of the Neo- 

Babylonian and Persian periods can be based. These three, he claims, 

“contradict each other”: 

“There are three principal sources with information regarding the 

chronology of the New Babylonian and Persian kings, namely, Strm 

Kambys 400, VAT 4956 and the Bible. The information in these three 

sources cannot be harmonized.” (p. 21; cf. also pp. 15, 45) 

And further: 

“It will be shown in the course of the book that there exist just two 

such independent sources which can give absolute dates for the New 

Babylonian chronology, namely, VAT 4956 and Strm Kambys 400 which 

already have been mentioned. … the chronology that is based on these 

two diaries cannot be harmonized with the Bible, and this means that at 

least one of the three sources must give erroneous information.” (p. 24) 

These statements reveal a remarkable ignorance of a subject that Furuli 

claims to have studied “for more than two decades.” The absolute chronology 

of the Neo-Babylonian and Persian eras is fixed by about 50 astronomical 

observational tablets (diaries, eclipse texts, and planetary texts). Almost all these 

tablets have been published in ADT volumes I and V. And the least reliable of 

them is probably Strm Kambys 400. (GTR 4 , ch. 2, last section). For example, there 

are about 25 diaries from the reign of Artaxerxes II (404-358 BCE), 11 of 

which have the royal name and regnal dates preserved. Most, if not all, of these 

appear to be, not later copies, but original compilations from Artaxerxes’ reign. 

(Letter H. Hunger to C. O. Jonsson, dated January 26, 2001) Therefore, to fix 

the absolute chronology of the reign of Artaxerxes II or any other Persian king, 

Strm Kambys 400 is needless and irrelevant. Nor is it needed to fix the reign of 

Cambyses, which can be more securely fixed by other texts. 

Additional comments about Strm Kambys 400 and the claim that some 

astronomical tablets contradict the Bible are discussed in Part Two of this 

review. 

Are scholars reluctant to publish oddly dated texts? 

Furuli argues against the validity of the so-called Canon of Ptolemy and 

traditional chronology by using certain oddly dated cuneiform texts that 

seemingly conflict with them. However, he admits that a few errors in the 

ancient texts cannot be used to overthrow a chronology that is substantiated by

many other texts: 


“One or two contradictory finds do not necessarily destroy a 

chronology that has been substantiated by hundreds of independent 

finds.” (p. 22) 

On the same page he gives three examples: 

(1) A tablet that, in 1878, T. G. Pinches said “would overthrow the perfect 

agreement of Mr. Boscawen’s list with the Canon of Ptolemy,” adding that “I 

did not intend to publish it at all.” But Furuli fails to mention that this is a tablet 

that at first seemed to be dated to “year 11” of Cambyses—which contradicts 

not only the Canon of Ptolemy but also Furuli’s Oslo Chronology. That is why 

Furuli, too, finds it necessary to reject it. 

As it happened, the odd date soon found an explanation. On the tablet, the 

figure for 1 had been written over the figure for 10. It was pointed out by A. 

Wiedemann (Geschichte Aegyptens, Leipzig, 1880, pp. 225f.) that this seemed to be 

a scribal correction of a mistaken “year 10,” which the scribe had tried to 

change to “year 1,” thus creating a date sign that easily could be misread as 

“year 11.” This simple and natural explanation was subsequently accepted by all 

scholars. (See my Supplement to The Gentile Times Reconsidered, Danville: Odeon 

Books, 1989, page 8.) The date, then, was not odd after all. 

(2) A tablet that “did not fit” PD’s “chronological scheme” and was rejected 

because “the month sign is shaded, and in view of known facts this date cannot 

be accepted.” But Furuli does not inform the reader that this tablet is Nabon. 

No. 1054 (BM 74972), which is dated in PD to Nbn VIII/10/17 (month VIII, 

day 10, year 17)—nearly one month after the fall of Babylon on VII/16/17. 

In 1990, I asked Christopher Walker at the British Museum to take another 

look at the date on this tablet. His collation, confirmed by other scholars, 

revealed that the year number had been misread. It was actually 16, not 17. The 

date of the tablet, then, was not in conflict with the chronology established for 

the reign of Nabonidus. Walker says: 

“On the Nabonidus text no. 1054 mentioned by Parker and Dubberstein p. 

13 and Kugler, SSB II 388, I have collated that tablet (BM 74972) and am 

satisfied that the year is 16, not 17. It has also been checked by Dr. G. Van 

Driel and Mr. Bongenaar, and they both agree with me.” (Letter Walker to 

Jonsson, Nov. 13, 1990) 

Thus, Furuli’s first two tablets cannot be used as examples of “contradictory 

finds” that conflict with the established chronology. This cannot be said of his 

third tablet, however, which clearly contains a scribal error. 

(3) BM 65494 dates itself to “Artaxerxes VI.4.50” (month VI, day 4, year 

50), a date that all scholars, for strong reasons, have concluded is an error for 

VI.4.40. Walker, too, points this out (which Furuli acknowledges but gives no 

source reference) in an unpublished list titled “Corrections and Additions to 

CBT 6-8.” This list has been worked out and kept up-to-date by Walker at the 

British Museum. It has been sent to correspondents in answer to questions 

asked about the dates on the tablets listed in the CBT 6-8 catalogues. (My two


versions of the list are dated in 1990 and 1996.) 

On page 27, Furuli mentions another example of an oddly dated tablet—a 

double-dated text from the accession year of Artaxerxes’ successor, Darius II. 

The tablet dates itself to “year 51, month XII, day 20, accession year of Darius, 

king of lands.” Furuli refers to this and the earlier text dated to Artaxerxes’ year 

50 as examples of how scholars “have been reluctant to publish tablets that seemed to 

contradict the traditional chronology.” 

But the very opposite is true. The above-mentioned reluctance of T. G. 

Pinches to publish the text dated to Cambyses’ 11th year was an exception. The 

typical scholarly reaction to dates that conflict with the traditional chronology is 

interest and attention, not suppression and reluctance to publish. When thenunpublished 

lunar eclipse tablets dated to the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II were 

brought up in an interview in 1968, Professor Abraham J. Sachs indicated how 

scholars would react to such oddly dated texts (they are now published in ADT 

V). Pointing out that these eclipse tablets all confirm the traditional chronology, 

he said: 

“I mean if they didn’t fit it would be worth publishing immediately. I mean 

dropping everything and saying this whole thing is a mess and there’s 

something wrong here. But they do fit.” (Transcript, p. 12, of an 

interview held with Professor A. J. Sachs at the Brown University, 

Providence, R. I., on June 24, 1968, by R. V. Franz and C. Ploeger, at 

that time members of the Watchtower headquarters’ Writing 

Department in Brooklyn, New York; emphasis added.) 

The tablet dated to year 50 of Artaxerxes I is listed by E. Leichty and A. K. 

Grayson in CBT VII, p. 153, and the tablet dated to his year 51 was published 

back in 1908 by A. T. Clay, in both cases evidently without any reluctance. As 

noted above, the latter text is doubled-dated. There are, in fact, 10 such texts 

with double dates, nine of which show that the accession year of Darius II 

corresponded to Artaxerxes’ year 41. That year 51 on the above-mentioned text 

is an error for year 41, therefore, cannot be seriously questioned. 

On pages 27 and 28, Furuli argues that, because there were three (actually 

four!) Persian kings named Artaxerxes, it is often difficult to know whether a 

tablet refers to king number I, II, or III. He claims that scholars, in trying to get 

the dates to tally with the traditional chronology, tend to give themselves up to 

circular reasoning. 

This situation, though, is not as bad as Furuli paints it. This is shown in Part 

Three of this review, in which I discuss in detail the reign of Artaxerxes I. 

Potential “sources of errors” in the Babylonian astronomical tablets: 

Furuli is well aware that the most damaging evidence against his Oslo 

Chronology is provided by the astronomical cuneiform tablets. For this reason, 

it is important that he tries to weaken the reliability of these texts. Thus, on 

pages 29-37, he describes nine “potential sources of error” that might 

undermine the trustworthiness of the astronomical tablets. Unfortunately, 

Furuli fails to draw a clear conclusion about these sources of error. Although it 

is true that errors exist with respect to various aspects of ancient tablets, Furuli


fails to explain how these errors affect the accuracy of traditional Neo- 

Babylonian and Persian chronology as a whole. He simply leaves the reader 

vaguely to conclude that, in some unspecified way, the possibility of errors 

invalidates the whole of the chronology. This is akin to someone stating, 

“Scientists make errors,” then implying but not actually stating that “all science 

is invalid because there are sources of error.” Thus, even though a particular 

astronomical tablet might contain enough errors to be useless for chronological 

purposes, it does not follow that all astronomical tablets are useless. 

But this is how Furuli generally argues. He uses errors in some tablets to cast 

aspersions on the reliability of tablets he does not like, such as VAT 4956. 

Inconsistently, he uses the tablet Strm Kambys 400 as a basis for his Oslo 

Chronology—obviously because the Watchtower Society uses it. 

A good example of Furuli’s false implication is his using the demonstrated 

errors in the ancient astronomical tablet known as the “Venus Tablet of 

Ammisaduqa” to imply that the tablet VAT 4956 is riddled with errors. Parts 

of the discussion on pages 29-37 of his book are based on an article by John D. 

Weir, “The Venus Tablets: A Fresh Approach,” in Journal for the History of 

Astronomy, Vol. 13:1, 1982, pp. 23-49. What are these Venus Tablets? 

The Venus Tablet of Ammisaduqa 

Weir’s article discusses the well-known and much-discussed Venus Tablet of 

Ammisaduqa. This tablet belongs to a particular series of some 70 tablets about 

celestial omens called Enuma Anu Enlil (EAE). The Venus Tablet is no. 63 in 

this series. It contains records of observations of the first and last visibilities of 

Venus made in the reign of Ammisaduqa, the penultimate king of the first 

dynasty of Babylon. This king probably reigned at least 1000 years before the 

Neo-Babylonian era. The fragmentary copies of the Venus tablet, found in 

Ashurbanipal’s library in Nineveh (Kouyunjik), are very late. The earliest pieces 

date from the reign of Sargon II (721-705 BCE). ( H. Hunger & D. Pingree, 

Astral Sciences in Mesopotamia, Leiden, etc.: Brill, 1999, p. 32) 

During the past hundred years, many attempts have been made to date the 

first dynasty of Babylon with the aid of the Venus Tablet, but no consensus has 

been formed. The reign of Ammisaduqa has been variously placed all the way 

from the late 3rd millennium down to the 7th century BCE. In 1929 and 1941, 

Professor Otto Neugebauer “demonstrated the impossibility of using the 

Venus Tablet to date the First Dynasty of Babylon.” (Hunger & Pingree, op. cit., 

pp. 37, 38) One reason this is impossible is that the extant copies bristle with 

copying errors. “The data set is the worst I ever have encountered as a 

statistician,” said Professor Peter Huber, explaining that “at least 20% to 40% 

of the dates must be grossly wrong.” (Peter Huber et al, Astronomical Dating of 

Babylon I and Ur III [= Monographic Journals of the Near East, Occ. Papers 1/4], 

Malibu, 1982, p. 14) 

Weir points to several sources of error connected with the attempts to date 

the fragmentary pieces of the Venus Tablet. But it would not be fair to 

presuppose that the same sources of error also apply to VAT 4956 and other 

important tablets on which the absolute chronology of the Neo-Babylonian and


Persian eras is based. These later tablets belong to the archive of about 1300 

astronomical observational texts found in the city of Babylon, texts that contain 

thousands of observations recorded from the period ca. 750 BCE—75 CE. 

In the discussion below, the subtitles are taken from Furuli’s summary of 

the nine supposed “sources for potential errors” listed in his Table 1 on page 

37. 

12,000-foot mountain range might preclude observations 

According to Furuli, one problem for the ancient Babylonian astronomers 

was the mountain range to the east of Babylon: 

“To the east of Babylon there is a mountain range rising to about 

12,000 feet above sea level, while the area to the west of the city is a flat 

desert. … it is obvious that the high mountains to the east of Babylon 

would prevent some observations.” (p. 29) 

Furuli then quotes Weir’s discussion of the change of the arcus visionis caused 

by “hills, mountains, trees and so on.” But the Zagros Mountains to the east of 

Babylon create no serious problems. The higher parts of the range begin about 

230 kilometers east of Babylon with Kuh-e Varzarin at about 9500 feet above sea 

level. Mountains “about 12,000 feet above sea level” lie considerably farther 

away. Due to the distance and the curvature of the earth, they are not visible 

from Babylon, at least not from the ground, as can be testified by anyone who 

has been there. Professor Hermann Hunger, for example, says: 

“I have been there [in Iraq], three years, of which two months were 

spent in Babylon. There are no mountains visible from Babylon.” 

(Communication Hunger to Jonsson dated December 4, 2003) 

It is possible, of course, that an observer atop the 90-meter-high 

Etemenanki ziggurat in Babylon (if the observations could have been made 

from there) could have seen a very thin, irregular line of mountains far to the 

east, although this, too, is doubtful. This might have affected the arcus visionis to 

some degree (the smallest angular distance of the sun below the horizon at the 

first or last visibility of a heavenly body above the horizon), which in turn could 

have changed the date of the first and last visibility of a heavenly body by a day 

or two. Parker and Dubberstein were well aware of this uncertainty, stating that 

“it is possible that a certain number of dates in our tables may be wrong by one 

day, but as they are purely for historical purposes, this uncertainty is unimportant.” (PD, p. 

25; emphasis added) PD’s tables were based on Schoch’s calculated values for 

the arcus visionis which, by an examination of 100 Venus observations dating 

from 462 to 74 BCE, Professor Peter Huber found to be “surprisingly 

accurate.” (Weir, op. cit., pp. 25, 29) 

Furthermore, this is a problem with astronomical texts that report only 

phenomena close to the horizon, as does the Venus Tablet. (Weir, pp. 25-47) 

Observations of lunar and planetary positions related to specific stars and 

constellations would not be affected. And it is these observations, which are 

usually higher in the sky and not in the horizon, that are the most useful for 

chronological purposes. As noted in GTR 4 , ch. 4, A-1, the astronomical tablet


VAT 4956 records about 30 such lunar and planetary positions, dated to 

various days and months in the 37th year of Nebuchadnezzar, thus fixing that 

year as 568/67 BCE with absolute certainty. 

Another problem Furuli mentions is related to the place of observation. He 

states that it “is assumed that the observations … were made in Babylon; if they 

were made in another locality this may influence the interpretation of the 

observations.” (p. 32) He then quotes from Weir’s discussion of the 

observations on the Venus Tablet of Ammisaduqa, which according to his 

calculations might have been made at “a latitude of 1½ degree north of 

Babylon.” This would be about 170 kilometers north of Babylon. 

Again, this problem applies to the Venus Tablet, the fragmentary copies of 

which were found in the ruins of Nineveh, but it does not apply to the archive 

of ca.1300 astronomical observational texts found in the city of Babylon. As 

shown by modern calculations, these observations must have been made in, or 

in the near vicinity of, Babylon. (Cf. Professor A. Aaboe, “Babylonian 

Mathematics, Astrology, and Astronomy,” The Cambridge Ancient History, Vol. 

III:2, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991, pp. 276-292) 

The crudeness of observations: Each zodiacal sign covers 30 degrees 

On page 32 Furuli mentions another potential source of error: 

“One problem is the crudeness of the observations. Because the 

tablets probably were made for astrological reasons, it was enough to 

know the zodiacal sign in which the moon or a certain planet was found 

at a particular point of time. This does not give particularly accurate 

observations.” 

By this statement Furuli creates a false impression that the lunar and 

planetary positions recorded on the Babylonian astronomical tablets are given 

only in relation to zodiacal signs of 30 degrees each. He supports this by quoting 

a scholar, Curtis Wilson, who in a review of a book by R. R. Newton made 

such a claim, stating that, “The position of the planet is specified only within an 

interval of 30 o .” (C. Wilson in Journal of the History of Astronomy 15:1, 1984, p. 40) 

Wilson further claims that this was the reason why Ptolemy, “when in need 

of earlier observations of these planets turns not to Babylonian observations 

but to those of the Alexandrians of the third century B.C., which give the 

planets’ positions in relation to stars.” (C. Wilson, “The Sources of Ptolemy’s 

Parameters,” Journal for the History of Astronomy, Vol. 15:1, 1984, pp. 40, 41) 

But anyone with even a cursory acquaintance with the Babylonian 

astronomical tablets knows that Wilson’s claim—repeated by Furuli—is false. 

Although it is true that many positions recorded on the tablets are given with 

reference to constellations along the zodiacal belt, the great majority of the 

positions, even in the earliest diaries, are given with reference to stars or 

planets. The division of the zodiacal belt into signs of 30 degrees each took 

place later, during the Persian era, and it is not until “toward the end of the 3rd 

century B.C.” that “diaries begin to record the dates when a planet moved from 

one zodiacal sign to another.” (H. Hunger in N. M. Swerdlow [ed.], Ancient 

Astronomy and Celestial Divination, London: The MIT Press, 1999, p. 77. Cf. B. L.


Van der Waerden, “History of the Zodiak,” Archiv für Orientforschung 16, 

1952/1953, pp. 216-230) During the entire 800-year period from ca. 750 BCE 

to ca. 75 CE, the Babylonian astronomers used a number of stars close to the 

ecliptic as reference points. As Professor Hermann Hunger explains in a work 

also used by Furuli: 

“In order to give the position of the moon and the planets a number of 

stars close to the ecliptic are used for reference. These have been called 

‘Normalsterne’ [Normal Stars] by Epping, and the term has remained in 

use ever since.” (H. Hunger in ADT, Vol. I, p. 17; emphasis added) 

On pages 17-19, Hunger lists 32 such normal stars known from the tablets. 

Noel Swerdlow states: “By far the most numerous observations of planets in 

the Diaries are of their distances ‘above’ or ‘below’ and ‘in front of’ or ‘behind’ 

normal stars and each other, measured in cubits and fingers.” (N. M. Swerdlow, 

The Babylonian Theory of the Planets, Princeton, New Jersey, 1998, p. 39) 

Such detailed observations are shown by VAT 4956, in which about twothirds 

of the lunar and planetary positions recorded are given in relation to normal 

stars and planets. And, in contrast to positions related to constellations, where the 

moon or a planet usually is just said to be “in front of,” “behind,” “above,” 

“below,” or “in” a certain constellation, the records of positions related to 

normal stars also give the distances to these stars in “cubits” (ca. 2–2.5 degrees) 

and “fingers” (1/24 of the cubit), as Swerdlow points out. Although the 

measurements are demonstrably not mathematically exact, they are considerably 

more precise than positions related only to constellations. As Swerdlow 

suggests, the measurements “may have been made with something as simple as 

a graduated rod held at arm’s length.” (Swerdlow, op. cit. p. 40) 

By parsing all the astronomical diaries in the first two volumes of 

Sachs/Hunger’s ADT, Professor Gerd Grasshoff “obtained descriptions of 

3285 events, of which 2781 are complete without unreadable words or broken 

plates. Out of those are 1882 topographical events [i.e., positions related to 

stars and planets], 604 are lunar observations called Lunar Six … and 295 are 

locations of a celestial object in a constellation.” (Gerd Grasshoff, “Normal 

Stars in Late Astronomical Babylonian Diaries,” in Noel M. Swerdlow [ed.], 

Ancient Astronomy and Celestial Divination, London: The MIT Press, 1999, p. 107) 

Thus, two-thirds of the positions are related to stars or planets, whereas only 

about 10 percent are related to constellations. 

In further support of his claim about the “crudeness of the observations” 

recorded on the Babylonian tablets, Furuli gives a lengthy quotation from B. L. 

van der Waerden. Unfortunately, Furuli has grossly misinterpreted van der 

Waerden’s statements. 

Van der Warden is discussing, not the crudeness of the observations, as Furuli 

claims, but the crudeness of the calculations that the Babylonian astrologers 

performed for the position of the moon at a point of time when the zodiacal 

sign in which the moon stood could not be determined by observation, either because 

of bad weather or because it was in daytime, when the stars are not seen. These 

calculated positions had to be deduced from observed lunar positions near such


a point of time. The observation that van der Waerden quotes from VAT 4956 

to show what was required for such calculations is exactly a lunar position 

related to a normal star, not just to a zodiacal sign: 

“At the beginning of the night of the 5 th the moon overtook by 1 

cubit eastwards the northern star at the foot of the Lion [= Beta Virginis].” (B. 

L. van der Waerden, Science Awakening II, 1974, p. 185) 

Furuli, then, has totally misunderstood van der Waerden’s discussion, 

because (1) he is speaking about the crudeness of (astrological) calculations, not 

about observations, and (2) the kind of observations needed for such calculations 

(which he shows by reference to VAT 4956) is detailed because the lunar 

position is given in relation to a star, with both distance and direction specified. Although 

van der Waerden’s example happens to contain a scribal error (see below under 

I-B-4), the information given is definitely not crude. It is specific and precise. 

The writing of the original tablet on the basis of observational notes 

A further source of error, according to Furuli, is “the process of writing 

down the data.” His discussion of this focuses on the astronomical tablet VAT 

4956, the “diary” dated to the 37th year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar. Furuli 

explains: 

“The tablet itself is a copy made a long time after the original was 

made, but even the original was not made at the time the observations 

were made. The tablet covers a whole year, and because clay hardly can 

be kept moist for 12 months, the observations must have been written 

down on quite a lot of smaller tablets, which were copied when the 

original was made.” (pp. 30, 31) 

Furuli describes the procedure correctly, and it is well known to 

Assyriologists. But Furuli adds in parentheses, “(provided that the data were 

not later calculated and there never was an ‘original tablet’.)” This theory—that 

Babylonian scholars at a later time calculated the information recorded on the 

astronomical diary VAT 4956 and dated it to the 37th year of 

Nebuchadnezzar—is false because many of the phenomena reported on the 

tablet were impossible to retrocalculate. 

Because Furuli repeats and elaborates this theory in Chapter 2, I will refute 

his claims in connection with my comments on that chapter. It is sufficient to 

point out that scholars agree that VAT 4956 is a faithful copy of the original, 

which is proven by modern computations of the positions recorded on the 

tablet. The copying errors are few and trivial, as pointed out in GTR 4 , ch. 4, A- 

1. (See further below under I-B-4.) 

I am aware of only one scholar who has tried to overcome the evidence 

provided by VAT 4956, namely, E. W. Faulstich, founder and director of the 

Chronology-History Research Institute in Spencer, Iowa, USA. Faulstich 

believes it is possible to establish an absolute Bible chronology without the aid 

of extra-Biblical sources, based solely on the cyclical phenomena of the Mosaic 

law (sabbath days, sabbath and jubilee years) and the cycle of the 24 sections of 

the levitical priesthood. One consequence of his theory is that the whole Neo- 

Babylonian period has to be moved backward one year. Because this conflicts


with the absolute dating of the period based on the astronomical tablets, 

Faulstich argues that VAT 4956 contains information from two separate years 

mixed into one. This idea, however, is based on serious mistakes. I have 

thoroughly refuted Faulstich’s thesis in the unpublished article, “A critique of 

E.W. Faulstich’s Neo-Babylonian chronology” (1999), available from me upon 

request. 

The copying and redaction of the original tablet 

This “source of error” is related to the previous one. As Furuli points out, 

VAT 4956 is a later copy in which the copyist tried to modernize the archaic 

terminology of the original tablet. This procedure, Furuli states, “may very well 

cause errors.” 

Copying errors do exist, but they usually create few problems in tablets that 

are fairly well preserved and detailed enough to be useful for chronological 

purposes. As discussed in GTR 4 , ch. 4, A-1, the dated lunar and planetary 

positions recorded in VAT 4956 evidently contain a couple of scribal errors. 

These errors, however, are minor and easily detected by modern computations 

based on the recorded observations. 

Thus, on the obverse (front) side, line 3 has day 9, which P.V. Neugebauer 

and E. F. Weidner pointed out in 1915 is a scribal error for day 8. Similarly, 

obverse, line 14 (the line quoted by van der Waerden above), has day 5, which 

is obviously an error for day 4. The remaining legible records of observed lunar 

and planetary positions, about 30, are correct, as is demonstrated by modern 

calculations. In their recent examination of VAT 4956, Professor F. R. 

Stephenson and Dr. D. M. Willis conclude: 

“The observations analyzed here are sufficiently diverse and accurate 

to enable the accepted date of the tablet—i.e. 568-567 B.C.— to be 

confidently confirmed.” (F. R. Stephenson & D. M. Willis in J. M. Steele & A. 

Imhausen (eds.), Under One Sky. Astronomy and Mathematics in the Ancient 

Near East, Munster: Ugarit-Verlag, 2002, pp. 423-428; emphasis added) 

Unknown length of the month—29 or 30 days 

The next source of error in Furuli’s list is “the unknown length of the 

month” in the Babylonian calendar: 

“In some instances we do know which months of a particular year in 

the reign of a particular king had 30 and which had 29 days, in most 

cases we do not know this. … our Babylonian calculation can be up to 

one day wrong according to the Julian calendar.” (p. 33) 

As I pointed out earlier under I-B-1, this is unimportant for chronological 

purposes. Parker and Dubberstein were there quoted as stating that “it is 

possible that a certain number of dates in our tables may be wrong by one day, 

but as they are purely for historical purposes, this uncertainly is unimportant.” 

(PD, p. 25) 

Often, when there is an uncertainty of one day, the corresponding Julian day 

for a dated Babylonian position of the moon or an inner planet can be


determined exactly by modern computations. This is particularly true of the 

moon because it moves 13 degrees a day along the ecliptic, which means that its 

position in the sky changes considerably in one day. 

Further, as Professor Peter Huber points out, “the Late Babylonian 

astronomical texts consistently indicate the month-length by stating whether 

the moon became visible on ‘day 30’ or on ‘day 1’.” This practice of indicating 

whether the previous month had 30 or 29 days is also consistently used in VAT 4956. (P. J. 

Huber et al, Astronomical Dating of Babylon I and Ur III. Monographic Journals of the 

Near East, Occasional Papers 1/4, June 1982, p. 7) 

Contradicting Furuli’s claim, Gerd Grasshoff, after his careful analysis of the 

2781 well-preserved observation reports in the diaries published in ADT, Vols. 

I and II (see above under I-B-2), concluded: 

“After having completed the successful interpretation of the 

observation reports, the analysis shows that 90% of the beginnings of 

the months are correctly predicted with an arcus visionis model, the rest 

differs only by one day.” (G. Grasshoff, op. cit., p. 109) 

A shift in the speed of the earth’s rotation 

Another source of error, according to Furuli, is the gradual change in the 

speed of the earth’s rotation. On page 33, he again quotes from Weir’s article 

about the Old Babylonian Venus Tablet of Ammisaduqa. Weir, in turn, quotes 

Huber, who explains that extrapolating the known rotation rates from the Neo- 

Babylonian period to the present, back to the preceding 1000-year period, is 

“beyond safe ground.” 

But Furuli’s quotation is irrelevant because Weir and Huber are discussing 

the 1000-year period that preceded Neo-Babylonian times. Weir and Huber both 

know that the change in the speed of the earth’s rotation has been established 

back to, and even somewhat beyond, the Neo-Babylonian period. This 

deviation (called Delta-T) has been known for a long time, although the value 

has been gradually refined. The best and most up-to-date examination of the 

deviation, based on hundreds of dated observations of lunar eclipses all the way 

back to the 8th century BCE, is that of Professor F. Richard Stephenson in 

Historical Eclipses and Earth’s Rotation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 

1997). (See also GTR 4 , appendix for chapter 4, section 2.) 

The rate of increase of the length of a day due to slowing down of the 

earth’s rotation, back to the 8th century BCE, has been fixed at an average of 

1.7 milliseconds per century (1.7 ms/c; Stephenson, op cit. pp. 513, 514; cf. New 

Scientist, 30 January 1999, pp. 30-33). For this period, therefore, we are on “safe 

ground.” Furuli can hardly be unaware of this. Today, the gradual change in the 

rate of the earth’s rotation is definitely not a significant source of error when 

using astronomical tablets from the Neo-Babylonian and Persian eras to 

calculate the chronology of these periods.


The interpolation of intercalary months to compensate for the difference 

between the solar and the lunar year 

Arguing that the interpolation of intercalary months in the Babylonian lunisolar 

calendar might be another potential source of error, Furuli (p. 34) quotes 

Drs. Ben Zion Wacholder and David B. Weisberg, who say: 

“As Professor Abraham Sachs pointed out in a communication to us, 

some of the readings of the intercalary months recorded in Parker and 

Dubberstein’s tables may not be quite reliable, while a handful are 

admittedly hypothetical. But even assuming the essential correctness of 

Parker and Dubberstein’s tables, Professor Sachs maintains, the 

supposition of a 19-year cycle prior to 386 B.C.E. may be reading into 

the evidence something which possibly is not there.” (Ben Zion 

Wacholder, Essay on Jewish Chronology and Chronography, New York, 1976, 

p. 67) 

Nothing in this statement is not also admitted by Parker and Dubberstein, 

as can be seen in Babylonian Chronology 626 B.C.—A.D. 75 (1956), pp. 1-9. As 

Wacholder and Weisberg further demonstrate in their work, the development 

of the 19-year standard scheme of intercalary months was a gradual process 

begun in the 7th century. The final stage took place in the 5th and early 4th 

centuries, when the seven intercalary months of the 19-year cycle were fixed in 

years 3, 6, 8, 11, 14, 17, and 19. This process is also clear in PD. 

Furuli concludes: “This means that calculations based on the Julian calendar 

can be wrong as much as 44 days or even more if the intercalary months were 

not added regularly.” (p. 35) This conclusion is based on the unlikely 

supposition that sometimes four years could pass before an intercalary month 

was added. But the weight of evidence, based on the economic and the 

astronomical texts, shows that this never happened after 564 BCE. (See the 

updated tables of documented intercalary months presented by Professor John 

P. Britton in J. M. Steele & A. Imhausen (eds.), Under One Sky, Münster: Ugarit- 

Verlag, 2002, pp. 34-35.) 

On page 35, Furuli again uses Weir’s discussion of the Venus Tablet of 

Ammisaduqa, this time as a basis for his claim that “a ‘best fit’ scheme is 

accepted.” This is undoubtedly true of scholars who have used the Venus 

Tablet of Ammisaduqa in their attempts to date the Hammurapi dynasty, but to 

imply that such a best fit scheme is also used to fix the absolute chronology of 

the Neo-Babylonian and Persian periods by means of VAT 4956 and other 

astronomical tablets—as if this were a last resort—is dishonest because it is 

simply not true. 

Different calendars used at different times 

Furuli notes that different calendars were used in antiquity by different 

peoples at different times. This, of course, is true. But because the use of the 

Babylonian luni-solar calendar in the Neo-Babylonian and Persian eras is well 

known, it is difficult to see how these other calendars can be “sources of 

potential error” in the examination of the Babylonian astronomical tablets. 

Furuli’s argument is a straw man.


Furuli mentions that the Egyptians “may have used two calendars” and 

states that this might be a problem in “connection with the Aramaic 

Elephantine Papyri.” (p. 36) These papyri are not astronomical texts. But, 

interestingly, some of them are double-dated in the sense that dates are given 

both in the Babylonian calendar and the Egyptian civil calendar. Because these 

texts are dated to the reigns of Persian kings in the 5th century BCE, they are 

useful to determine the chronology of the period and are discussed in a later 

part of this review. 

The human factor—and modern researchers 

Furuli mentions “the human factor” that might cause “the misreading of a 

tablet due to lack of capacity.” (p. 37) This is clearly a potential source of error. 

Many odd dates found in works about the tablets published during the past 120 

years are due to this factor. It is important, therefore, when such odd dates are 

encountered in modern works, to have the original tablet collated afresh. 

Strangely, Furuli uses many such dates uncritically and without collation. Some 

examples of this have already been given above under I-A-2 and others are 

presented in later parts of this review. 

Chapter II - ”The Litmus Test of the Absolute Chronology” 

Using astronomical tablets for establishing absolute dates 

In this chapter, Furuli discusses using astronomical tablets to establish an 

absolute chronology. In view of the varied quality and state of preservation of 

the Babylonian astronomical tablets, not all are usable for chronological 

purposes. Accordingly, Furuli states that each tablet must meet “two 

fundamental requirements.” What are they? 

Furuli’s criteria for the chronological use of astronomical tablets 

The first requirement is the following: 

“A. The positions of the heavenly bodies must be observed by the 

eye of a scribe and written down at the same time; and they must not 

only represent backward calculations made at a much later time.” 

This criterion is quite in order. The value of the next requirement, 

however, is dubious: 

“B. The name of the ruling king must have been written on the 

tablet at the time when the observations were made.” 

One problem with this criterion is that it is unrealistic. Furuli admits that: 

“because clay hardly can be kept moist for 12 months, the 

observations must have been written down on quite a lot of smaller 

tablets, which were copied when the original was made.” (p. 30)


Modern scholars who take notes on paper face a similar task of collating 

their notes. Suppose a scholar is reviewing a book, and on page one of his notes 

he records the name of the book. Then he scribbles various comments on 

items of interest. The notes run to many pages, but he does not record the title 

of the book on every page. When he is finished reading, perhaps months later, 

he collates and condenses the scribbled notes and writes a neat summary. Does 

the fact that he failed to write the book’s title on every single page of the notes 

invalidate the summary? Of course not. In like manner, if the name of a ruling 

king is not written down on “smaller tablets, which were copied when the 

original was made,” it certainly does not invalidate the observations transferred 

to the final tablet, which is subsequently viewed as the original. Furuli’s 

criterion B, then, is absurd. 

It is transparently obvious that Furuli invented criterion B to disqualify 

tablets that could otherwise be used to invalidate his Oslo Chronology. Usually, 

the royal name is given only at the beginning of each tablet. But if a tablet is 

damaged and the beginning part is missing, the date connected with each 

observation recorded is given as the regnal year, the month, the day, and 

perhaps the part of the night, with no royal name. However, the observations 

might well be so detailed that the observed events can still be identified and 

dated to particular Julian years. This is often enough to identify the ruler, even 

if his name is missing. A couple of examples serve to illustrate this. 

The planetary tablets No. 54 and No. 56 

Two tablets that do not meet Furuli’s second requirement (B) are LBAT 

1393 and LBAT 1387+1486+1388, published as Nos. 54 and 56 in Hunger’s 

ADT, Vol. V. Both are planetary texts that unequivocally overthrow Furuli’s 

alternative reigns for Darius I and Artaxerxes I. Furuli gratuitously dismisses 

both tablets (pp. 37, 118, 211, and 227) for erroneous, specious, and illusory 

reasons. I examine his statements in detail later in this review. 

Text No. 54 records observations of Jupiter dated to several regnal years of 

a king whose name is not preserved. The preserved regnal year numbers are 23 

on the obverse side and 8, 19, 20, 31, and 32 on the reverse side. The ruler 

whose reign is treated on the reverse side must have had a long reign because 

the last preserved regnal year is 32. The observations recorded for these five 

years can be safely dated to years 514, 503, 502, 491, and 490 BCE. The 

observations on the obverse side dated to year 23, however, are too badly 

damaged to be usable. 

The second text, No. 56, records about 80 preserved positions of Venus, 

half of which are related to Normal Stars. The data are arranged in 8-yeargroups 

and 8 columns. The positions are dated to about 20 different regnal 

years (most of them fully legible or identifiable as part of the overall 

arrangement) that can be fixed to specific Julian years within the 70-year period 

from 463/2 to 393/2 BCE. The first king in this period must have had a very 

long reign because the highest preserved regnal year for him is 39. The 

observations recorded for this year can be dated to 426/5 BCE. The reason the 

royal names are missing in both texts is that these parts of the tablets are 

broken.


How tablets 54 and 56 make mincemeat of Furuli’s Persian chronology 

All Julian dates pointed to by tablets 54 and 56 fall within the reigns of 

Darius I, Artaxerxes I, Darius II, and Artaxerxes II, not only according to the 

traditional chronology but also according to Furuli’s Oslo Chronology. These tablets, 

therefore, can be used to challenge his alternative chronology for these reigns. 

It turns out that Furuli’s attempts to push the reign of Darius I one year 

forward and the reign of Artaxerxes I 10 years backward are effectively blocked 

by these two tablets. The Jupiter observations dated in year 32, for example, 

clearly belong to year 490 BCE, not year 489 as required by Furuli’s revised 

chronology. In fact, none of the observations dated to specific months and 

days in the Babylonian luni-solar calendar can be moved forward or backward 

in the way Furuli’s revisions require. 

Jupiter’s period of revolution is close to 12 years, which means that on average 

its position among the stars changes about 30 degrees a year. However, the 

apparent movement among the stars displays stationary points and even 

reversals of motion. Tablet 54 illustrates this by saying that in year 31, month 

VI, on day 28, Jupiter “became stationary in [the constellation of] Gemini.” 

This was exactly the position it held on October 4, 491 BCE, so this date 

corresponds to day 28 of month VI in the Babylonian calendar. A year later, 

Jupiter had moved about 30 degrees to a new position between the 

constellations Leo and Cancer. The recorded position, then, does not allow the 

31st year of Darius I to be moved one year forward. The Jupiter phenomena do 

not repeat themselves at the same date within the lunar month for another 71 years, 

the fact of which the Babylonian astronomers were fully aware. Therefore, 

tablet 54 cannot be assigned to any reign other than that of Darius I. The 

Jupiter positions in tablet 54 dated to the other four regnal years just as 

inexorably block any attempt to change the absolute chronology established for 

Darius’ 36-year reign. 

Venus, with a period of revolution of only 224.7 days, returns to its position 

in relation to various stars and constellations in less than a year. However, it 

does not return to the same position at the same time of the year—not after one year or 

after 10 years. Such returns occur at 8-year intervals, after 13 revolutions 

(8x365.2422 = 13x224.7). The observations on tablet 56, then, which are dated 

to specific regnal years, months and days, cannot be fitted into a chronology for 

the reign of Artaxerxes I that is moved 10 years backward. 

It might be argued that the observations on the two tablets could belong to 

kings whose reigns fell in entirely different centuries. But such alternatives are 

limited to kings whose reigns lasted at least 32 years (the highest preserved 

regnal year in the Jupiter text No. 54) and 39 years (the highest preserved regnal 

year in the Venus text No. 56). 

Within the period to which all extant Babylonian observational astronomical 

cuneiform texts belong (except for the Venus tablet of Ammisaduqa)—i.e., 

from the middle of the 8th century BCE to the 1st century CE—only five kings 

are known to have ruled that long or longer: the Assyrian king Ashurbanipal 

(42 years), the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar (43 years), and the Persian


kings Darius I (36 years), Artaxerxes I (41 years), and Artaxerxes II (46 years). 

Another possibility is that the regnal years could refer to years in the Seleucid 

era (counted from 312/11 BCE). 

By using a modern astro-program (Chris Marriott’s SkyMap Pro 10), I have 

checked all the alternatives to the reigns of Darius I and Artaxerxes I—and also 

the alternative chronologies for these reigns suggested by Furuli’s Oslo 

Chronology—and found them all to be impossible. The planetary observations 

combined with the regnal years and the dates in the Babylonian luni-solar 

calendar fit only the traditional chronologies established for the reigns of 

Darius I and Artaxerxes I. 

Attempts to invalidate tablets 54 and 56 

Tablets 54 and 56 do not meet Furuli’s second requirement (B), but he 

attempts to undermine the strength of their evidence in other ways. 

On page 37, Furuli refers to tablet No. 54 (LBAT 1393) and states that there 

“may be different factors, which contribute to the misreading of a tablet due to 

lack of capacity.” He quotes a statement about tablet 54 by Hunger: 

“The following reconstruction of the tablet was proposed by C.B.F. 

Walker, who notes that any discrepancies between the years attested on 

this tablet and the dates reported by A. Sachs in LBAT, p. xxix are to be 

explained by the fact that the tablet was not baked and cleaned until 

1978.” (ADT, Vol. V, p. 158) 

Isolated from context, this seems to indicate that the translation of the 

tablet was a mere proposed reconstruction and that it might have been misread 

“due to lack of capacity.” This seeming indication is wrong. 

Walker’s reconstruction is not an attempted translation of the preserved part 

of the tablet. It is a suggested reconstruction of the chronological scheme of the 

original, undamaged tablet, which might have covered all the 48 regnal years 

from 536/5 to 489/8 BCE arranged as a series of 12-year cycles. The 

reconstruction is shown in a table on page 159 of ADT V. The actual 

transliteration and translation of the tablet, with its preserved dates, 

observations, etc., follows on pages 160-165, after the table. 

The regnal years that Sachs had read on the tablet (LBAT, 1955, p. xxix) 

before it was baked and cleaned in 1978 were not misreadings that conflict with 

the dates read after the cleaning. The “discrepancies” referred to are additional 

dates that became legible after the cleaning, dates that increase the 

chronological value of the tablet. The way Furuli refers to this tablet is 

thoroughly misleading. 

Furuli mentions tablet No. 56 in three places in his book, on pages 118, 211, 

and 227. One reason for this spread seems to be that the tablet consists of three 

pieces, LBAT 1387, 1388, and 1486 (also listed by Hunger as A, B, and C), 

which Furuli tends to deal with separately and in different places in his book. 

The first two pieces (A + B) contain much information, so much in fact, that 

Hunger’s translation of them covers 10 large pages in ADT, Vol. V. Almost all 

the observations preserved on the two pieces are dated to various regnal years


of Artaxerxes I, the only exception being one dated to year 6 of his successor, 

Darius II. Piece C, on the other hand, is a very small fragment, and Hunger’s 

translation of it covers only half a page. No regnal year numbers are preserved 

on it. Hunger writes (ADT , p. 172) that the observations recorded on it 

probably refer to years 5 and 12 of Artaxerxes II (400 and 393 BCE). 

Furuli focuses exclusively on piece C in his description of tablet 56 on page 

211, implying that Hunger’s description of this little fragment applies to the 

whole text: 

“The planetary text consisting of the three pieces LBAT 1387, 1486 

and *1388 is supposed to list Venus data between -462/61 and -392/91. 

This text is quite fragmentary. One scholar made this comment: ‘of C, 

the obverse probably refers to Artaxerxes II year 5, the reverse to year 

12. The astronomical information preserved fits this date, especially a 

close encounter of Venus and a Leonis in month III of Art II year 5.’ 

These words are rather cautious, indicated by the adverb ‘probably.’ As a 

matter of fact, neither Venus nor any other planet is mentioned on C, Obv. and 

Rev. An interpreter may feel there are clues for identifying Venus, but none are 

mentioned. So there are problems with this text in connection with the making 

of an absolute chronology.” 

Furuli does not talk about the extensive information in pieces A and B, 

leaving the reader with the impression that the entire Venus tablet is as 

fragmentary and problematic as piece C. In a discussion on page 118, he makes 

some comments about piece A (1387) but these, too, are aimed at undermining 

the strength of the text. He erroneously claims that on this tablet “years 15, 27, 

35 are clearly visible, but no other years,” whereas in fact eight regnal years are 

visible on the text, namely, years 7, 15, 23, 27, 31, 35, 39 (of Artaxerxes I), and 

year 6 (of his successor Darius II). For example, Furuli points out that in T. G. 

Pinches’ copy of the tablet published by Sachs in 1955, “the number ‘7’ is 

shaded and not clearly seen.” But as Sachs explains (LBAT, p. vii), Pinches 

copied from tablets that usually had not been oven-fired, and that “it is to be 

expected that improved readings will result from oven firing.” Hunger’s 

translation indicates that number 7 is now clearly seen on the tablet, which may 

be a result of this. The observations recorded for year 7 in months I, II, III, IV, 

V, and VI all fit the 7th year of Artaxerxes I, 458 BCE. Further, Furuli fails to 

mention that number 7 is required by the arrangement of the data in 8-yeargroups. 

It is followed horizontally in the next columns by year numbers 15, 23, 

31, 39, and year 6. The 8-year intervals, of course, refer to the periodicity of 

Venus positions. 

About the same number of years (in the reign of Artaxerxes I) paired at 8- 

year intervals are visible in piece B (1388)—years 4, 5, 12, 13, 20, 21, 28 and 

2[9]. On page 227, Furuli says that piece B is in conflict with the Oslo 

Chronology, but his only explanation is that “the regnal years written by the 

scribe need not be correct.” This desperate theory is discussed in section II-C 

below. 

Tablets 54 and 56 are disastrous for Furuli’s revised Persian chronology, and 

he knows it. That is why he wants to get rid of them by every possible


expedient. And that is also why he wants to undermine the trustworthiness of 

the astronomical tablets in general by indicating that they probably mainly contain 

calculations, not actual observations. 

Are most astronomical positions calculated rather than observed? 

The “most acute problem for making an absolute chronology based on 

astronomical tablets,” Furuli claims, is that many, “perhaps most positions of 

the heavenly bodies on such tablets, are calculated rather than observed.” (p. 

15) 

Is it possible that the Babylonian astronomers could retrocalculate all or 

most of the phenomena recorded on astronomical tablets? Are there 

indications in the recorded data that they did just that? 

As discussed in GTR 4 , Ch. 4, Babylonian astronomers recognized the 

various cycles of the sun, the moon, and the five planets visible to the naked 

eye. It is clear that at an early stage they were able to predict or retrocalculate 

certain phenomena, such as the occurrences of lunar eclipses and certain 

planetary positions. Does this mean, then, that all or most of the phenomena 

recorded on the astronomical tablets might have been computed rather than 

observed, as Furuli claims? 

Phenomena that Babylonian astronomers were able to calculate 

In support of the idea that most of the recorded positions of the heavenly 

bodies on the astronomical tablets might have been calculated rather than 

observed, Furuli presents on page 39 three isolated quotations. All but the first 

of the references and footnotes are confused, incomplete, or wrong. 

The first quotation, taken from Bertel L. van der Waerden’s work, Science 

Awakening (Vol. II, 1974, pp. 281, 282), deals with the ability of the Babylonian 

astronomers to calculate the time that a planet entered a certain zodiacal sign or 

the position it held when it could not be observed because of clouds or because 

it was too near to the sun. These calculations presuppose that Babylonian 

astronomers had worked out theories for dating and locating certain recurring 

planetary phenomena and had tables at hand that listed planetary positions at 

regular intervals. Such lists, which were termed “ephemerides” by Professor 

Otto Neugebauer, are called “cardinal tables” by van der Waerden. All extant 

tables of this kind are late, almost all dating from the 3rd to the 1st centuries 

BCE. 

The next quotation, erroneously ascribed to van der Waerden, is actually 

from Otto Neugebauer’s three-volume work, Astronomical Cuneiform Texts (1955, 

Vol. II, p. 281). Neugebauer’s work does not deal with the observational tablets 

but is exclusively devoted to the arithmetical astronomical texts (mainly the tables 

of ephemerides mentioned above) from the last few centuries BCE. It is in his 

discussion of such texts that Neugebauer points to “the minute role played by 

direct observation in the computation of the ephemerides,” a statement that 

Furuli greatly stresses by repeating it in extra bold type in a box on the page. 

What does Neugebauer really mean?


To be able to work out theories about the regular occurrence of planetary 

phenomena, the Babylonians needed numerous observations of the planets 

over long periods. Such observations were provided by the astronomical 

archives available since the middle of the 8th century BCE. When planetary 

theories were finally worked out, planetary tables could be used for calculating 

planetary positions when direct observations were not possible. Astronomical 

observational tablets, therefore, such as diaries and planetary texts, contain 

observations as well as occasional calculations. This is pointed out by van der 

Waerden in Furuli’s 3rd quotation. 

In this quotation, van der Waerden speaks of the difficulty of deciding 

“whether text data were observed or calculated.” Furuli does not explain that 

van der Waerden is discussing a text that Furuli, on page 128, claims to be “the 

tablet which is most important for Persian chronology, Strm Kambys 400.” Van 

der Waerden’s statement is particularly applicable to this text, which seems to 

contain mainly calculations. Some scholars even question whether it records any 

observations. 

It is clear that Babylonian astronomers could calculate a number of 

astronomical phenomena. At an early stage, they were using the Saros cycle for 

calculating and predicting the occurrences of lunar eclipses. As shown by the 

later ephemeride tables, they also learned how to calculate and predict the 

occurrences of certain periodic planetary phenomena such as first and last 

visibilities, stationary points, and retrogradations. But does this mean that they 

were able to calculate or predict all the different astronomical phenomena 

reported on the observational tablets? 

Phenomena the Babylonian astronomers were unable to calculate 

Although the Babylonian astronomers were able to calculate and predict 

certain astronomical events, the observational texts—diaries, planetary texts, 

and eclipse texts—contain reports of several phenomena and circumstances 

connected with the observations that could not have been calculated. 

That the diaries usually record real observations is shown by their reports of 

climatological phenomena. For example, the scribes repeatedly report when bad 

weather prevented astronomical observations. We often find reports about 

“clouds and rain of various sorts, described in detail by numerous technical 

terms, as well as fog, mist, hail, thunder, lightning, winds from all directions, 

often cold, and frequent ‘pisan dib’, of unknown meaning but always associated 

with rain.” (Professor N. M. Swerdlow, The Babylonian Theory of the Planets, 

Princeton University Press, 1998, p. 18) Other recorded phenomena were 

rainbows, solar halos and river levels. None of these could have been 

retrocalculated much later. What, then, about the astronomical phenomena? 

Discussing the various planetary phenomena recorded in the texts, 

Swerdlow observes: 

“Conjunctions of planets with the moon and other planets, with their 

distances, could neither be calculated by the ephemerides nor predicted 

by periodicities.” (Swerdlow, op. cit., p. 23)


Swerdlow further explains: 

“The distances of planets from normal stars could be predicted,” but 

“there was no way of predicting distances of the moon from planets or 

of planets from each other.” (ibid., p. 173) 

Note that VAT 4956 records a number of such— for the Babylonian 

astronomers— unpredictable and incalculable phenomena. 

What about the lunar eclipse reports? Could they have been computed at a 

later date? In referring to the 18-year texts (the “Saros cycle texts”), Furuli uses 

the term “Saros tablets,” but he does not make it clear whether he is referring 

to all extant 18-year tablets (about a dozen) or to a particular group of such 

texts. On page 40, he mentions two sets of tablets that use the 18-year Saros 

scheme. The first, he says, covers the period from 747 to 315 BCE. His 

footnote 51 shows that the set consists of lunar eclipse tablets LBAT 1413– 

1417 and 1419 (= Nos. 1–4 in Hunger, ADT, Vol. V). The other “set” he 

mentions is actually just one tablet that scholars generally refer to as the “Saros 

Tablet,” BM 34576 (= No. 34 in ADT, Vol. V). It covers the 468-year period 

from 567 to 99 BCE. 

But Furuli does not explain that the first of his two “sets” is a series of 

observational texts that record both observed and predicted lunar eclipses at 18- 

year intervals, whereas the Saros Tablet belongs to a small group of five 

theoretical texts that do not record any lunar eclipse observations at 18-year 

intervals but contain only tables of royal names and dates at 18-year intervals. 

(See John M. Steele in ADT, Vol. V, pp. 390-393.) The Saros Tablet does show 

some traces of a possible eclipse report, but this appears at the bottom of the 

reverse side after the 18-year table. It is written at right angles to the main text 

and is clearly separated from it. 

Despite this basic difference between the observational and theoretical 18-year 

tablets, Furuli seems to regard all of them as “hypothetical tablets,” which is 

incorrect. In addition, his use of the plural term “Saros tablets” is confusing, as 

he does not clearly explain which 18-year texts he is referring to apart from the 

Saros Tablet, BM 34576. 

With respect to the eclipse observations reported on the lunar eclipse 

tablets, including the Saros cycle tablets (discussed in GTR 4 , Ch. 4, C), the 

Babylonian astronomers were certainly able to predict and retrocalculate the 

occurrences of lunar eclipses, but they were unable to predict or calculate a 

number of important details about them. This is discussed by Dr. John M. 

Steele in his work, Observations and Predictions of Eclipse Times by Early Astronomers 

(Dordrecht, Boston, and London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2000) and in 

the article, “Eclipse Prediction in Mesopotamia.” (Archive for History of Exact 

Sciences, Vol. 54, 2000, pp. 421-454) 

Commenting on the claim that the eclipse records on the lunar eclipse 

tablets might be retrocalculations by Babylonian astronomers in the Seleucid 

era, Steele explains: 

”You were absolutely right when you argued that the Babylonians 

could not have retrocalculated the early eclipse records. The Saros cycle


could have been used to determine the date of eclipses, even centuries 

earlier, but none of the Babylonian methods could have allowed them to 

calculate circumstances such as the direction of the eclipse shadow, the 

visibility of planets during the eclipse, and certainly not the direction of 

the wind during the eclipse, which we find in early reports (e.g. Text No 

3 in Hunger’s latest book states that the eclipse shadow crossed the 

moon’s surface in a southerly direction during the eclipse in Bel-ibni’s 1 st 

year [Obv, I, 2-5], and Obv II, 1-7 says that the west wind blew during 

the eclipse of BC 686 Oct 15). Although the Babylonians could calculate 

the time of the eclipses, they could not do so to the same level of 

accuracy as they could observe—there is a clear difference of accuracy 

between eclipses they said were observed and those they say were 

predicted (this is discussed in my book), which proves that the ‘observed’ 

eclipses really were observed. 

It is true that the Saros Canon texts published most recently by Aaboe et al 

in 1991 are retrocalculated—but they are theoretical texts and should be 

considered separately from the observational material of the Diaries and the 

eclipse texts in Hunger’s book. The observational material alone is enough to 

confirm Parker & Dubberstein’s chronology, with only very minor, and noncumulative, 

corrections.” (Communication Steele to Jonsson, March 27, 2003) 

Most of the contents of the observational texts are observations 

Although the observational texts, due to particular circumstances such as 

bad weather, occasionally contain calculated events, most of the entries are 

demonstrably based on actual observations. That this is the case with the 

Diaries is directly indicated by the Akkadian name engraved at the end and on 

the edges of these tablets: natsaru sha ginê, which means “regular watching.” 

(Sachs/Hunger, ADT, Vol. I, p. 11) 

Scholars who have examined these tablets in detail agree that they contain 

mostly genuine observations. Professor Hermann Hunger gives the following 

description of the various kinds of astronomical data recorded in the Diaries: 

“Lunar Six [i.e., the time differences between the settings and risings 

of the sun and the moon just before and after opposition]; planetary 

phases, like first and last visibility … conjunctions between planets and 

the so-called Normal Stars … eclipses; solstices and equinoxes; 

phenomena of Sirius. Toward the end of the 3rd century B.C., Diaries 

begin to record the dates when a planet moved from one zodiacal sign 

into another. The rest of the Diaries’ contents is non-astronomical.” 

Hunger adds: 

“Almost all of these items are observations. Exceptions are the solstices, 

equinoxes, and Sirius data, which were computed according to a scheme 

... furthermore, in many instances when Lunar Sixes, lunar or solar 

eclipses, or planetary phases could not be observed, a date or time is 

nevertheless given, marked as not observed. Expected passings of 

Normal Stars by the moon are sometimes recorded as missed because of 

bad weather, but never is a distance between moon and Normal Star


given as computed.” (Hermann Hunger in N. M. Swerdlow (ed.), Ancient 

Astronomy and Celestial Divination, London: The MIT Press, 1999, pp. 77, 

78; emphasis added) 

Steele similarly concludes: 

“Most of the contents of the Diaries represent observations; however, where 

observations were unavailable, for example because of bad weather or 

because an event was expected to occur at a moment when the heavenly 

body was below the horizon, then predictions were entered in their 

place. In addition, some data recorded in the Diaries, such as solstices 

and equinoxes, were always predicted.” (John M. Steele, “Eclipse 

Prediction in Mesopotamia,” Archive for History of Exact Sciences, Vol. 54, 

2000, p. 429; emphasis added) 

Whether an entry is based on observation or calculation is often directly 

stated in the text itself. In the eclipse reports, this is usually indicated by the 

terminology. Steele explains: 

“As a general rule, eclipse predictions can be distinguished from 

observations by the terminology used: sin AN-KU 10 denotes an 

observed eclipse of the moon, whereas the opposite order, AN-KU 10 sin, 

refers to a predicted lunar eclipse (for solar eclipses sin is replaced by 

šamáš). Furthermore, predicted eclipses are usually described as being šá 

DIB meaning that they would be omitted when the luminary was below 

the horizon, or ki PAP NU IGI meaning ‘watched for, but not seen’ 

when the anticipated eclipse failed to appear.” (ibid., p. 429) 

In summary, Furuli’s claim that “perhaps most positions of the heavenly 

bodies on such tablets, are calculated rather than observed” is groundless. It is 

refuted by statements in the tablets themselves and by the fact that they contain 

data that the Babylonians were unable to calculate. These circumstances are 

diametrically opposed to the suggestion that the data in the astronomical diary 

VAT 4956 might have been calculated later so that possibly “there never was 

an ‘original tablet’.” (Furuli, p. 30) 

Furuli elaborates on this mistaken idea on page 40. Pointing out that VAT 

4956 and Strm Kambys 400 “have the characteristics of being copies,” he then 

goes on to consider “possible ways that such copies could be made by a scribe 

in the 2nd century B.C.E.” He imagines that a scribe could make up such 

tablets by using “three different schemes that were at his disposition:” 1) a 

scheme of 18-year Saros cycles; 2) a scheme of regnal years of consecutive 

kings going backward in time, and 3) a scheme of intercalary months. Then he 

states: “By a combination of these three schemes, no observation was 

necessary, but a sophisticated chronology could be made for hundreds of years 

backward in time.” 

As was demonstrated above, the theory that VAT 4956 and other 

observational texts could have been made up at a much later time is nothing 

but a wild imagining. The idea is just wishful thinking based on insufficient 

knowledge of the astronomical tablets.

A theory of desperation 


If the entries on the observational tablets—diaries, and lunar and planetary 

tablets—record mostly demonstrably genuine observations, and if the 

Babylonian astronomers were unable to compute and retrocalculate many of 

the astronomical and other data reported, how, then, is it possible for anyone to 

wriggle out of the evidence provided by these tablets? 

Because the tablets often contain so many detailed observations dated to 

specific regnal years that they can be safely fixed to particular Julian years, the 

only escape is to question the authenticity of the regnal year numbers found on the 

tablets. 

This is what Furuli does. He imagines that “a scribe could sit down in the 

2nd century and make a tablet partly of some phenomena covering many years, 

partly on the basis of theory (the three schemes) and partly on the basis of 

tablets from a library” that might show real observations. Then, upon discovery 

that the dates on the library tablets conflicted with the theoretical data, “these 

erroneous data could be used to ‘correct’ the correct data of his library tablet, to 

the effect that the tablet he was making would contain wrong data of regnal 

years.” (Furuli, p. 41) 

Furuli indicates that not only the dates on the lunar and planetary tablets but 

also the dates on the diaries might have been tampered with by the Seleucid 

scholars in the same way. Referring again to the fact that the earliest extant 

diaries are copies, he says: 

“But what about the regnal year(s) of a king that are written on such 

tablets? Have they been calibrated to fit an incorrect theoretical 

chronological scheme, or have they been copied correctly?” (Furuli, p. 

42) 

Furuli realizes, of course, that his Oslo Chronology is thoroughly 

contradicted by the Babylonian astronomical tablets. That is the reason he 

proposes, as a last resort, the theory that these tablets might have been redated 

by Seleucid scholars to bring them into agreement with their own supposed 

theoretical chronology for earlier times. Is this scenario likely? What does it 

imply? 

The scale of the supposed Seleucid chronological revisions 

To what extent does Furuli’s Oslo Chronology differ from the traditional 

chronology? In a chronological table on pages 219-225 covering the 208 years 

of the Persian era (539–331 BCE), Furuli shows, reign by reign, the difference 

between his chronology and the traditional one. It turns out that the only 

agreement between the two are the dating of the reigns of Cyrus and 

Cambyses—the period from the fall of Babylon (539 BCE) to 523/2 BCE, a 

period of 17 years. By giving Bardiya one full year of reign after Cambyses, 

Furuli moves the whole 36-year reign of Darius I one year forward, as 

mentioned earlier. Then he moves the reigns of Darius’ successors Xerxes and 

Artaxerxes I 10 years backward by adding 10 years to the reign of the latter, 

creating a coregency of 11 years between Darius I and Xerxes.


But Furuli also assigns a one-year reign to the usurper Sogdianus between 

Artaxerxes I and Darius II. The effect of this is that the remaining reigns up to 

331 BCE are all moved one year forward. The end result is that Furuli’s Oslo 

Chronology is at variance with the traditional chronology for the Persian era for 

191 of its 208 years, or for 92 percent of the period. 

But this is not all. As mentioned in the introduction, Furuli wants to add 20 

extra years to the Neo-Babylonian period somewhere after the reign of 

Nebuchadnezzar—between 562 and 539 BCE. The effect of this—what Furuli 

calls the “domino effect”—is that not only the reign of Nebuchadnezzar but all 

the reigns of his predecessors are moved backward 20 years. 

Because the Babylonian astronomical archive starts with the reign of 

Nabonassar, 747-734 BCE, Furuli’s Oslo Chronology is at variance with the 

traditional chronology for most, if not the whole, of the Babylonian era from 

747 to 539 BCE. This means that the disagreement between the two runs to 

more than 90 percent of the 416-year period from 747 to 331 BCE. This also 

means that the Oslo Chronology is contradicted by more than 90 percent of the 

astronomical observational texts—diaries, eclipse texts, and planetary texts— 

dated to this period. Because these tablets record thousands of observations 

dated to particular regnal years, months, and days within this period, we begin 

to get some idea of the scale of the chronological revisions the Seleucid 

scholars must have engaged in—according to Furuli’s theory. Yet, this is only a 

fraction of the full scope of the necessary revisions. 

The scope of the original astronomical archive 

It should be kept in mind that the archive of ca. 1300 nonmathematical and 

principally observational astronomical cuneiform tablets is only a fraction of 

the scope of the original archive available to the Seleucid scholars. In a lecture 

held at a conference in 1994, Professor Hunger explained: 

“To give you an idea of how much was originally contained in that 

archive, and how much is still preserved, I made a few rough estimates. 

From well preserved Diaries, I found that in each month about 15 lunar 

and 5 planetary positions, both in relation to Normal Stars, are reported. 

Also, every month the so-called lunar Six are recorded. Each year will in 

addition contain 3 Sirius phases, 2 solstices and 2 equinoxes, at least 4 

eclipse possibilities or eclipses, and about 25 planetary phases. Together, 

this results in about 350 astronomical observations per year. In 600 

years, 210,000 observations are accumulated. Now I do not know 

whether the archive was ever complete to this extent. Sometimes copies 

of older Diaries indicate that things were missing in the original. But on 

the whole, this is the order of magnitude. By counting the number of 

reasonably (i.e., not completely, but more than half) preserved months, I 

arrived at ca. 400 months preserved in dated Diaries (undated fragments 

do not help for the purposes of this lecture). If we compare this to a 

duration of 600 years for the archive, we see that we have preserved ca. 5% of 

the months in Diaries.” (H. Hunger, “Non-Mathematical Astronomical 

Texts and Their Relationships,” in N. M. Swerdlow (ed.), Ancient


Astronomy and Celestial Divination, London: The MIT Press, 1999, p. 82; 

emphasis added) 

If only five percent of the original Babylonian astronomical archive is 

preserved today, the scale of the chronological revisions Furuli thinks Seleucid 

copyists engaged in becomes apparent. To bring their whole archive into 

harmony with their supposed theoretical chronology, they would have had to 

redate thousands of tablets and tens of thousands of observations. Is it likely 

that they believed so strongly in a supposed theoretical chronology that they 

bothered to redate four centuries’ worth of archives containing thousands of 

tablets? The idea is absurd. 

We can also ask why the Seleucid scholars would work out a theoretical 

chronology for earlier centuries when a reliable chronology for the whole 

period back to the middle of the 8th century could easily be extracted from the 

extensive astronomical archive at their disposal. Is it not much more realistic to 

conclude that their chronology was exactly the one found in the inherited 

archive of tablets, an archive that had been studied and expanded by successive 

generations of scholars up to and including their own? 

It should be noted that, to make any claims at all about dates in his Oslo 

chronology, Furuli must rely on the dating of the tablets that the Seleucids 

supposedly revised. But if one assumes that his chronology is valid, then so 

must be the dates recorded on the tablets—which destroys his claim that the 

Seleucids revised the tablets. Thus, Furuli’s argument is internally inconsistent 

and cannot be correct. 

Another problem is what became of the original pre-Seleucid tablets. A 

necessary consequence of Furuli’s theory is that almost all extant tablets should 

reflect only the erroneous theoretical chronology of the Seleucid scholars, not 

what Furuli regards as the original and true chronology—the Oslo Chronology. 

In his view, therefore, all or almost all extant tablets can only be the late revised 

copies of the Seleucid scholars. Thus, on page 64, he claims: “As in the case of 

the astronomical diaries on clay tablets, we do not have the autographs of the 

Biblical books, but only copies.” This is certainly true of the Biblical books, but 

is it true of the astronomical diaries? Is there any evidence to show that all the 

astronomical tablets preserved today are only copies from the Seleucid era? 

Are all extant tablets late copies from the Seleucid era? 

It is certainly true that some of the earliest diaries, including VAT 4956, are 

later copies. They frequently reflect the struggle of the copyist to understand 

the ancient documents they were copying, some of which were broken or 

otherwise damaged. Twice in the text of VAT 4956, for example, the copyist 

added the comment “broken off,” indicating he was unable to decipher some 

word in the original. Often the documents used archaic terminology that the 

copyists tried to modernize. What about diaries from later times? 

As an example, there are about 25 diaries from the reign of Artaxerxes II 

(404-358 BCE), 11 of which not only preserve the dates (year, month, day) but 

also the name of the king. (Sachs/Hunger, ADT, Vol. I, pp. 66-141) Some of


them are extensive and contain numerous observations (e.g., nos. –372 and – 

366). None of these tablets show any of the above-mentioned signs of being 

later copies. Is it likely, then, that they, or at least some of them, are originals? 

This question was sent to Professor Hunger a few years ago. He answered: 

“In my opinion, the diaries from the time of Artaxerxes II can all be 

from his reign. You know that the larger diaries are all copies in the 

sense that they are collections of smaller tablets which covered shorter 

periods. But that does not mean that they were copied much later. To 

me it would make most sense if after every half a year the notes were 

copied into one nice exemplar. I had a quick look through the edition 

and did not find any remarks like ‘broken’ which are an indication that 

the scribe copied an older original. So I would answer your question ‘is it 

likely’ by ‘Yes’.” (Hunger to Jonsson, January 26, 2001) 

These tablets, therefore, do not reflect any “theoretical chronology” 

supposedly invented by the later Seleucid scholars. The tablets might very well 

be original documents. We cannot take it for granted that they are late copies 

from the Seleucid era. And the same holds true, not only for the diaries from 

the reign of Artaxerxes II but for most of the observational tablets dating from 

before the Seleucid era. 

Even if some of the diaries and other tablets dated to the earliest centuries 

are later copies, it is not known how late these copies are, or whether they were 

copied in the Seleucid period or earlier. One interesting example is the lunar 

eclipse tablet LBAT 1420 (No. 6 in Hunger’s ADT, Vol. V). This tablet 

contains annual records of lunar eclipses dated to the first 29 years of 

Nebuchadnezzar. (See GTR 4 , Ch. 4, C-3) Steele says of it that “this text was 

probably compiled not long after its final entry in –575 [= 576 BCE].” (Archive 

for History of Exact Sciences, Vol. 54, 2000, p. 432) But even if the compilation 

was made in the mid-6th century BCE, the question still is whether the tablet is 

a copy or not. If it is a copy, how late is it? Steele explains: 

“In answer to your question, there is nothing conclusive in the text 

that points to a date of composition as the mid-sixth century. However, 

some of the terminology points to an early date, for example, the 

inclusion of US ‘(time-)degrees’ after the timings is rare in late texts (the 

unit is usually just implied by the context), and the facts that the 

predicted eclipses have no times and the general lack of many details of 

the observed eclipses are also suggestive of an early date. There is no 

evidence for the modernizing of terminology, but because the 

observations are quite brief there are not many occasions where 

modernizing could have taken place (it is easier to spot in things like star 

names and the ways in which the moon and planets are said to be near 

certain stars, neither of which appear in this text). For these and other 

reasons, the text feels to me like it is contemporary with the material it 

contains. 

Now that all refers to the date on which the text was composed, not 

the date of the tablet. We have no idea whether this is an original text or 

one copied in the Seleucid period. (The appearance of a ‘variant’ time in


Obv. I, 4’, which I failed to mention in my book, does not necessarily 

imply the text has been copied–it could just be that the scribe who 

compiled the text had reports of this eclipse from 2 different observers.) 

If it is a copy, then I think it is a straight copy, with no attempt to change 

or modify the text. 

Because almost none of the diaries and other observational texts have 

colophons, we can never be sure whether texts are copies or originals.” 

In conclusion, the theory that Seleucid scholars worked out an erroneous 

hypothetical chronology for earlier times that they systematically embodied into 

the astronomical tablets they were copying cannot be supported by the available 

facts. It is not based on historical reality and is a desperate attempt to save 

cherished but false dates. 

Chapter III - ”The languages and script of the original documents” 

Linguistic pitfalls 

In this chapter, Furuli says little about chronology. He starts by describing 

some of the basic features of the Akkadian, Aramaic, Hebrew, and Sumerian 

languages, with a view to discussing “to which extent the signs and peculiarities 

of a language may be the cause of some of the contradictory chronological 

evidence that we find.” (p. 47) He gives Akkadian the most space and gives the 

other three languages just a few paragraphs. 

On pages 49-56, Furuli provides general information about Akkadian signs 

for words, syllables, and numbers. In the middle of this discussion, on pages 

52-54, he attempts to identify Marduk, the chief god of Babylon, as a 

deification of Nimrod. This is an old theory suggested by Julius Wellhausen in 

the late 19th century and subsequently picked up by many others, including 

Alexander Hislop in The Two Babylons (1916, 2nd ed. 1959, footnote on p. 44). It 

was adopted for some time by the Watchtower Society, which presented it in 

the book “Babylon the Great Has Fallen!” God’s Kingdom Rules! (1963, pp. 33, 34) 

with arguments similar to those Furuli quotes from The International Standard 

Bible Encyclopaedia, The Encyclopaedia Britannica, The Jewish Encyclopedia, and The 

Two Babylons. The theory was included in the Watchtower Society’s Bible 

dictionary Aid to Bible Understanding (1971, p. 668) but was dropped in the 

revised 1988 edition, Insight on the Scriptures (Vol. 2, p. 974). It was still briefly 

mentioned in The Watchtower magazine of April 1, 1999, on page 11. 

On the modern reading and understanding of Akkadian, Furuli feels that, 

although, generally speaking, “we can have confidence in the translations of 

cuneiform tablets that have been published in English, German, French and 

other languages … it is important to be aware of the pitfalls” (p. 56). The 

pitfalls Furuli lists are: (1) the difficulty of piecing together broken tablets, (2) 

the reconstruction of only partially legible signs, (3) the changed meaning of 

some signs through time, (4) the confusion of similar signs, and (5) the 

difficulty of correctly reading very small single signs. (p. 58)


Modern Akkadian scholars who have spent decades examining cuneiform 

tablets are aware of these and other pitfalls, but Furuli’s experience in this area 

seems to be limited. Although he says that he is “able to read and work with 

original documents in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek and Akkadian” (p. 14), he 

seems to have examined the majority of the tablets he discusses or refers to 

only second or third hand, by consulting published copies, transcriptions, 

transliterations, and translations in works written by other scholars—some of 

which date from the late 19th century. That is evidently why, in the 

Introduction, Furuli says he is “interested to be informed about tablets where 

collation indicate [sic] errors in the published transliterations or transcriptions.” 

(p. 14, ftn. 5; cf. also p. 58, ftn. 67) If such tablets are used in a scholarly work 

in support of a revised chronology, the collations should precede, not follow, 

publication. This stipulation is particularly important for a work that the author 

claims is aimed at replacing Parker and Dubberstein’s classical study from 1956 

on Babylonian Chronology. 

For many years, I have asked modern Akkadian scholars to collate original 

tablets with odd dates in published translations, including a number of those 

used by Furuli and his coreligionists in support of their alternative chronology, 

often with disastrous results for the suggested revisions. Therefore, when Furuli 

claims that “scores of tablets have been published with anomalous dates, 

particularly in the New Babylonian Empire” (p. 58), it would be interesting to 

know which tablets he is referring to and to what extent he has had their dates 

collated afresh. 

The mysterious Marduk-shar-usur 

As one example of “possible reading errors,” Furuli refers on page 60 to a 

Neo-Babylonian tablet that Chad W. St. Boscawen found in 1877 among the 

Egibi tablets that had just arrived at the British Museum from Iraq. The tablet 

was dated to day 23, month 9 (Kislev), year 3 of a Neo-Babylonian king, whose 

name Boscawen first read as Marduk-sar-uzur. 

Boscawen placed the name in a separate Addenda of a paper that was read 

before The Society of Biblical Archaeology in London on June 5, 1877. At a 

discussion held the following month (not the next year, as Furuli writes), on 

July 3, 1877, Boscawen stated that, on further examination, he had arrived at 

the conclusion that Marduk-sar-uzur “is a variant name for Nergal-sar-uzur” 

(i.e., Neriglissar). He explained: 

“When we have some 2,000 tablets to go through, and to read names, 

which, as everyone who has studied Assyrian knows, is the most difficult 

part, because it is not easy always to recognize the same name, as it may 

be written four or five different ways, you may judge it is an arduous 

task. I have copied two apparently different names; but afterwards found 

them to be variants of the same name.” (Transactions of the Society of Biblical 

Archaeology (TSBA), Vol. VI, 1878, p. 78 and pp. 108-111) 

Attempting to extend the Neo-Babylonian period (as required by the 

Watchtower Society’s chronology), Furuli had argued in an earlier paper that 

Marduk-shar-usur must have been an extra, unknown king who ruled for at 

least three years during the Neo-Babylonian period. I discussed this idea at


length in Supplement to The Gentile Times Reconsidered (1989), pp. 20-24. (See also 

the comments on Marduk-shar-usur in GTR 4 , App. for Ch. 3, ftn. 24.) Because 

Boscawen did not give the BM number of the tablet, it could not be identified 

and collated at that time. But in his new book, Furuli identifies the tablet as BM 

30599, a transliteration and translation of which is published as No. 83 in 

Ronald H. Sack’s Neriglissar—King of Babylon (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener 

Verlag, 1994, pp. 224, 225). Furuli’s identification seems convincing: The date 

on BM 30599 is the same as that given by Boscawen, “month Kislev, 23rd day, 

in the third year.” Boscawen further adds that “the contracting parties are 

Idina-Marduk son of Basa, son of Nursin; and among the witnesses, Dayan- 

Marduk son of Musezib.” (TSBA VI, p. 78) The same individuals also appear 

on BM 30599 (the latter not as a witness but as an ancestor of the scribe). Sack, 

however, reads the royal name on the tablet not as Marduk-shar-usur but as Nergalšarra-usur 

(transliterated d U+GUR-LUGAL-SHESH). 

But Furuli seems unwilling to give up the idea that an unknown Neo- 

Babylonian king named Marduk-shar-usur might have existed. Not only does 

he argue that the cuneiform signs for Nergal and Marduk can be confused but 

also that this “can work both ways,” so that “it is possible that Boscawen’s 

reading was correct after all” and also that it cannot be excluded that some of 

the tablets ascribed to Nergal-shar-usur should have been read as Marduk-sharusur. 

(p. 62) 

To determine whether such confusion is possible, I sent an email message 

to C. B. F. Walker at the British Museum and asked him to collate the original 

tablet (BM 30599). In his answer, he states: 

“I have just taken BM 30599 out to check it, and I do not see how 

anyone could read the name as anything other than d U+GUR-LUGAL- 

SHESH. A reading Marduk-shar-usur would seem to be completely 

excluded. Our records show that the tablet was baked (and cleaned?) in 

1961, but it had been published by T G Pinches in the 5 th volume of 

Rawlinson’s Cuneiform Inscriptions of Western Asia, plate 67 no. 4 in a copy 

which clearly shows d U+GUR. It was also published by Strassmaier in 

1885 (Die babylonischen Inschriften im Museum zu Liverpool: Brill, Leiden, 

1885) no. 123, again clearly with d U+GUR. So the reading cannot be put 

down to our cleansing the tablet in 1961, if we did.” (Walker to Jonsson, 

October 15, 2003) 

An anonymous Jehovah’s Witness scholar from South America, who has 

been investigating this subject, has since written to a number of Assyriologists 

around the world about the matter. None of the 11 scholars who responded 

agree with Furuli’s suppositions. One of them, Dr. Cornelia Wunsch in 

London, who also personally collated the original tablet, pointed out that “the 

tablet is in good condition” and that there is “no doubt about Nergal, as 

published in 5R 64,4 by Pinches. More than 100 years ago he already corrected 

the misreading by Boscawen.” She also explains that “Boscawen was not a great 

scholar. He relied heavily on the notes that G. Smith had taken when he first 

saw the tablets in Baghdad.” (Cf. GTR 4 , Ch. 3, B-3a, ftn. 67)


Clearly, Furuli has been trying to make too much of Boscawen’s misreading 

of this tablet, partly because he had not collated, or asked anyone to collate, the 

original tablet before he published his book and evidently also, as shown by his 

comments, because his knowledge of Akkadian is insufficient. 

A second witness to a Neo-Babylonian king Marduk-shar-usur? 

In further support of the possible existence of a king named Marduk-sharusur, 

Furuli refers to “another tablet from New Babylonian times (BM 56709) 

dated on the 12th day, month x, in the 1st year of a king whose name starts 

with Marduk, but where the rest is broken. This king is unknown.” (p. 61) This 

text is listed in the Catalogue of the Babylonian Tablets in the British Museum (CBT), 

Vol. 6 (London: The Trustees of the British Museum, 1986, p. 215). In an 

unpublished list of “Corrections and additions to CBT 6-8” (Mon, Mar 18, 

1996), which Walker keeps at the British Museum, Walker gives the following 

comments on the text: 

“56709 Marduk-[…] 12/–/1 Dated at Borsippa. CT 55, 92 (not CT 56, 

356). 

The tablet is probably early Neo-Babylonian.” 

Note the word “probably” and the words “early Neo-Babylonian.” This is a 

suggestion. Furthermore, scholars often use the term “Neo-Babylonian” to 

describe a more extended period than 625-539 BCE. The Assyrian Dictionary, for 

example, starts the period at about 1150 BCE and ends it in the 4th century 

BCE. (see GTR 4 , Ch. 3, ftn. 1) Maybe this is how Walker uses the term here. 

The names of about a dozen Babylonian kings between ca. 1150 and 625 BCE 

begin with Marduk-, including Marduk-apla-iddina II (the Biblical Merodach- 

Baladan, Isa. 39:1, who ruled in Babylon twice, 721-710 and 703 BCE), and 

Marduk-zakir-shumi II (703). Thus, as the royal name is only partially legible 

and we don’t know exactly to which period the tablet belongs, it is useless for 

chronological purposes. 

The examples above show how important it is to have the original tablets 

collated before using seemingly odd dates or royal names found in published 

translations to support chronological revisions. They also show that such 

readings should be done by experienced scholars who are linguistically 

competent. 

Chapter IV - “Old chronological accounts of the New Babylonian kings” 

Chapter 4 consists of two parts. In the first part, pp. 66-75, which I will call 

part A, Furuli reviews some of the ancient secondary and tertiary sources that 

contain information about Neo-Babylonian kings and their reigns. In the 

second part, pp. 75-92, which I will call part B, he discusses six of the Biblical 

passages that mention a period of 70 years, claiming that they all refer to the 

same period—namely, a period of complete desolation of Judah and Jerusalem 

during the Jewish exile in Babylonia. This accords with the view of the 

Watchtower Society.

Secondary and tertiary sources 


Furuli’s presentation of the secondary and tertiary sources for the Neo- 

Babylonian chronology seems to be based mainly on the surveys of R. P. 

Dougherty in Nabonidus and Belshazzar (New Haven: Yale University Press, 

1929, pp. 7-10) and Ronald. H. Sack in Neriglissar—King of Babylon (Neukirchen– 

Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1994, pp. 1-22). Most of the ancient authors that 

Furuli mentions lived hundreds of years after the Neo-Babylonian era, and their 

writings, which are preserved only in very late copies, often give distorted royal 

names and regnal years. Most of these sources, therefore, are useless for 

chronological purposes. (See GTR 4 , Ch. 3, A). This can be seen in Furuli’s table 

on page 74, in which he lists the concordant chronology for the Neo- 

Babylonian era given by Berossus (3rd century BCE) and Ptolemy’s Royal 

Canon, together with the conflicting figures of Polyhistor (1st century BCE), 

Josephus (1st century CE), the Talmud (5th century CE), Syncellus (c. 800 CE), 

and, strangely, a totally corrupt kinglist from 1498 CE. Putting such distorted 

sources in the same table with Berossus and the Ptolemaic Canon—the two 

most reliable chronological sources for the Neo-Babylonian era next to the 

cuneiform documents themselves—suggests that the sources are equally 

unreliable and should not be trusted. That this is the purpose of the table is 

obvious from Furuli’s comments on its conflicting figures: 

“The spread of numbers in the table shows that different 

chronologies regarding the New Babylonian kings existed from old times,” 

and “that there were many different traditions describing the New Babylonian 

chronology.” (pp. 74, 75; emphasis added) 

But this is not really what Furuli’s table shows. Rather, it demonstrates to 

what extent figures can change through time and can be distorted by being 

quoted and copied time and again by various authors and copyists over a period 

of nearly 2000 years. 

Furuli starts by stating that “the modern model of the New Babylonian and 

Persian chronology was not constructed on the basis of Babylonian sources, 

but rather on the basis of secondary or tertiary sources from other places.” (p. 

66) But this statement is a distortion because it suggests that the new 

foundation of chronology is the same as the old one. Furuli should have added 

that, in the latter half of the 19th century, the thousands of Babylonian 

cuneiform documents found in Mesopotamia that became available to scholars 

enabled them to construct a new foundation for Neo-Babylonian chronology 

directly on primary sources. Furuli has committed the fallacy known as 

“suppressed evidence” because his argument fails to consider relevant facts. 

Berossus on the Neo-Babylonian reigns 

Berossus’ Neo-Babylonian chronology, says Sack, “most closely 

corresponds to that of the cuneiform documents.” (Sack, op. cit., p. 7) Furuli 

quotes this statement on page 67, but on the next page he mentions some of 

the mythological material and errors in Berossus’ discussion of earlier 

Babylonian periods. The obvious purpose of this is to call into question 

Berossus’ statements about Neo-Babylonian chronology. This is a form of ad 

hominem argument called “poisoning the well,” in which someone presents


unfavorable information (true or false) about an opponent to suggest that any 

claim he makes is probably false. In other words, it is an attempt to bias the 

audience. 

The only difference between Berossus’ writings and contemporary Neo- 

Babylonian cuneiform sources is that Berossus assigns Labashi-Marduk a reign 

of nine months instead of two or three. Referring to this difference, Furuli 

quotes Sack’s statement that “it is hardly likely (in view of his overall accuracy) 

that Berossus could have been incorrect in his figures for the reign of this latter 

monarch.” Sack does not mean that Berossus’ figure of nine months is correct 

but that, in view of Berossus’ overall accuracy, his original figure for Labashi- 

Marduk must have been correct. He holds that the figure nine is most likely a 

scribal error arising during manuscript transmission. He concurs with the 

explanation of Parker and Dubberstein that the Greek letter theta (used for 

number 9) is most likely a mistake for an original letter beta (used for number 

2). These two letters are rather similar and could easily be confused in ancient 

handwritten manuscripts. Sack states: 

“This position seems all the more sensible since the earliest text from 

the reign of Nabonidus (May 25, 556 BC) is clearly dated nearly a full 

month prior to the latest document bearing the name of Labashi-Marduk 

(June 20, 556 BC).” (R. H. Sack, op. cit., 1994, p. 7) 

Furuli fails to inform the reader of Sack’s clarifications. 

In a further attempt to undermine confidence in Berossus’ information 

about the Neo-Babylonian reigns, Furuli quotes Berossus’ English translator 

Stanley Mayer Burstein, who points out that “the Babyloniaca contains a number 

of errors of simple fact of which, certainly, the most flagrant is the statement 

that Nabopolassar ruled Egypt.” (p. 67) But is this error really that flagrant? 

Berossus does not say that Nabopolassar conquered Egypt after Necho’s defeat at 

Harran; instead he describes the Pharaoh as a rebellious satrap “who had been 

posted to Egypt, Coele-Syria, and Phoenicia.” Posted [or placed, tetagménos] 

how? 

Assyria controlled Egypt in the 7th century BCE, and Ashurbanipal installed 

Psammetichus I (664-610 BCE) as a vassal ruler in Memphis. Under 

Psammetichus’ long rule, Egypt gradually gained independence and finally 

became an ally of Assyria against Babylon. After the Babylonians finally crushed 

the Assyrian empire in 609 BCE (despite Egypt’s assistance), the Babylonians 

regarded former Assyrian territories as their inheritance, even though some 

territories immediately started to fight for independence. From the Babylonian 

point of view, then, the defeated Pharaoh Necho would be regarded as a 

rebellious satrap because, on retreating from Harran in 609 BCE, Necho 

appropriated the Hattu area (Syria-Palestine) in the west. The Jewish historian 

Dr. Menahem Stern gives the following comments about Berossus’ statement: 

“From the point of view of those who regarded the neo-Babylonian 

empire as a continuation of the Assyrian, the conquest of Coele-Syria 

and Phoenicia by the Egyptian ruler might be interpreted as the rape of 

Babylonian territory.” (M. Stern, Greek and Latin Authors on Jews and 

Judaism, Vol. I, Jerusalem: Jerusalem Academic Press, 1974, p. 59)

Flavius Josephus’ conflicting statements 


Furuli’s discussion of Flavius Josephus’ information about the Neo- 

Babylonian chronology is not reliable because it is partially based on an 

obsolete text of Josephus’ works. He starts by quoting Josephus’ distorted 

figures for the Neo-Babylonian reigns at Antiquities X,xi,1-2: 

“Nabopolassar 29 years, Nebuchadnezzar 43 years, Amel-Marduk 18 

years, Neriglissar 40 years.” (p. 69) 

Furuli got these figures from William Whiston’s antiquated translation of 

1737, which was based on a text that is no longer accepted as the best textual 

witness. Had he consulted a modern translation of Josephus’ Antiquities, he 

would have discovered that Nabopolassar, at least, is correctly given 21—not 

29—years. (See, for example, Ralph Marcus’ translation in the Loeb Classical 

Library.) 

Furuli believes that Josephus mentions the wrong figure elsewhere. Still 

following Whiston’s obsolete translation, he states in footnote 90 on page 69: 

“In Against Apion, sect. 17 [error for I,19], Nabopolassar is ascribed 

29 years, but this is a quote from Berossus. Josephus does not mention 

Nabopolassar and the length of his reign elsewhere.” 

This statement, too, is wrong. Against Apion I,19, like Antiquities X,xi,1, 

assigns Nabopolassar 21 years, according to all modern textual editions of 

Against Apion.* 

* Excursion: The best textual editions of Josephus’ Against Apion are those of 

Benedictus Niese in Flavii Iosephi Opera, Vol. V (Berlin: Weidmann, 1889), Samuel 

Adrianus Naber in Flavii Iosephi Opera Omnia, Vol. VI (Leipzig: B. G. Teubner, 1896), 

H. St. J. Thackeray in Josephus (= Vol. 38:1 in the Loeb Classical Library, London: 

William Heinemann, and New York: G. P. Putnamn’s Sons, 1926), and Théodore 

Reinach & Léon Blum, Flavius Josèphe Contre Apion (Paris: Société d’Èdition “Les 

Belles Lettres,” 1930). William Whiston’s translation was based on manuscripts that 

go back to one from the 12th century preserved in Florenz, Codex Laurentianus plut. 

lxix 22, usually referred to as L. Although this is the oldest preserved Greek 

manuscript of Against Apion, the best textual witness of Josephus’ excerpts from 

Berossus in I,19 is Eusebius’ quotations from Josephus’ Against Apion in his 

Preparation for the Gospel, Book IX, Chapter XL, and also in the Armenian version of 

his Chronicle, 24,29 and 25,5. Both works give Nabopolassar 21 years. This figure is 

further supported by the Latin translation (”Lat.”) of Against Apion made in the 6th 

century. (C. Boysen, Flavii Iosephi Opera ex Versione Latina Antiqua VI:II [= Vol. 

XXXVII in the Vienna Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum], 1898, p. 30. See 

also the comments on the textual witnesses by Alfred von Gutschmid in his 

“Vorlesungen über Josephus’ Bücher,” published in Kleine Schriften [ed. by Franz 

Rühl], Band 4, Leipzig, 1893, pp. 500, 501). Josephus’ Antiquities X,xi,1 clearly gives 

Nabopolassar a reign of 21 years. The figure 29 given in Codex Laurentianus (L) from 

the 12th century (on which all later manuscripts are based) is, therefore, 

demonstrably a late distortion that is corrected in all modern textual editions of 

Against Apion and Antiquities. (See also the comments by Thackeray, op. cit., pp. xviii, 

xix.)


At the end of page 69, Furuli quotes two widely separated sections from 

Against Apion. The first is taken from Against Apion I,19 (§§ 131,132), in which 

Josephus is referred to as saying that, according to Berossus, 

“ [Nabopolassar] sent his son Nabuchodonosor with a large army to 

Egypt and to our country, on hearing that these people had revolted, and 

how he defeated them all, burnt the temple at Jerusalem, dislodged and 

transported our entire population to Babylon, with the result that the city 

lay desolate for seventy years until the time of Cyrus, king of Persia.” 

The remarkable thing about this statement is that it places the burning of 

the temple in the reign of Nabopolassar. But it actually took place 18 years later 

during the 18th year of his son and successor Nebuchadnezzar. The result is 

that Josephus, who here regards the 70 years as a period of desolation, starts 

the period in the last year of Nabopolassar (i.e., in 605 BCE). Furuli is quoting 

from Thackeray’s translation in the Loeb Classical Library and, in a footnote at 

the bottom of the page, quotes Thackeray: “The burning of the temple, not 

mentioned in the extract which follows, is presumably interpolated by 

Josephus, and erroneously placed in the reign of Nabopolassar.” Clearly, 

Josephus’ application of the 70 years in this passage is based on a serious 

distortion of his sources. He seems to have confused events concerning 

Jerusalem in the last year of Nabopolassar’s reign with events in the 18th year 

of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign. 

Furuli’s next quotation, which he places directly after the first, is taken from 

Against Apion I,21 (§ 154), and begins: 

“This statement is both correct and in accordance with our books.” 

This might give a reader the impression that Josephus is still speaking of the 

70-year-long desolate state of Jerusalem in Furuli’s preceding quotation. But, as 

stated above, the two quotations are from widely separated sections. Josephus 

is referring to his lengthy quotation from Berossus in the immediately 

preceding section (I,20, §§ 146-153), in which Berossus gives the length of all 

the Neo-Babylonian kings from Nebuchadnezzar to Nabonidus: 

Nebuchadnezzar 43 years, Awel-Marduk 2 years, Neriglissar 4 years, Labashi- 

Marduk 9 months, and Nabonidus 17 years. It is this chronology Josephus 

refers to when he immediately goes on to say that it “is both correct and in 

accordance with our books.” (Against Apion I,21, § 154) He then explains why it 

is correct: 

“For in the latter [the Scriptures] it is recorded that Nabuchodonosor 

in the eighteenth year of his reign devastated our temple, that for fifty 

years it ceased to exist, that in the second year of the reign of Cyrus the 

foundations were laid, and lastly that in the second year of the reign of 

Darius it was completed.” 

According to Berossus’ figures, there were ca. 49 years from 

Nebuchadnezzar’s 18th year until the end of Nabonidus’ reign. Because the 

foundation of the temple was laid in the 2nd year of Cyrus (Ezra 3:8), Josephus’ 

statement that the temple had been desolate for “fifty years” is in agreement 

with Berossus’ chronology. (For the textual evidence supporting the figure 50 

in Against Apion, see GTR 4 , Ch. 7, A-3, ftn. 30.)


It is obvious that Josephus, in his works, repeatedly presents confusing and 

erroneous statements about the Neo-Babylonian reigns and conflicting 

explanations of the period of Jerusalem’s desolation. It is only in his latest 

discussion, in which he quotes Berossus’ figures, that his statements can be 

shown to roughly agree with reliable historical sources. 

The chronology of Ptolemy’s Canon—centuries older than Ptolemy 

How important are the writings of Claudius Ptolemy (2nd century CE) for 

the chronology established for the Neo-Babylonian era? Furuli assigns them a 

decisive role: 

“One of the most important sources for the present New Babylonian 

chronology is Claudius Ptolemy (2nd century C.E.). As one author 

expressed it: ‘The data from the Almagest provide the backbone for all 

modern chronology of antiquity’.” (p. 70) 

The author quoted is Professor Otto Neugebauer, who until his death in 

1990 was a leading authority on the astronomical cuneiform tablets. What did 

he mean? Did he mean that the ancient astronomical observations that Claudius 

Ptolemy presented in Almagest still are the principal or perhaps even the sole 

basis for the absolute chronology scholars have established for the Neo- 

Babylonian and Persian periods? As will be demonstrated below, definitely not. 

Recurring themes in Furuli’s book are (1) that the Neo-Babylonian and 

Persian chronology builds on the writings of Claudius Ptolemy, (2) that 

Claudius Ptolemy was a fraud who falsified the ancient observations he used, 

and (3) that, therefore, the chronology established for those ancient periods is 

false. As early as page 13, Furuli claims: 

“The modern view of the chronology of the old world builds on the 

writings of Claudius Ptolemy. Twenty-five years ago the geophysicist R. 

R. Newton argued that Ptolemy was a fraud because he claimed he made 

observations when instead he made calculations backwards in time.” 

But Furuli’s thesis is a straw man, an argument without substance. No 

informed scholar today holds that the writings of Claudius Ptolemy are now the 

basis of the chronology established for the Ancient Near East. True, Parker and 

Dubberstein stated half a century ago that they had used the Ptolemaic Canon 

and some other classical sources as a general basis for their Babylonian 

chronology. But they went on to explain that they checked, confirmed, and 

improved this chronology by using Babylonian cuneiform texts such as 

chronicles, kinglists, economic texts, and astronomical tablets. (PD, 1956, p. 10) 

Furthermore, Claudius Ptolemy did not originally create the Ptolemaic 

Canon—he merely reproduced an existing list of kings. As Professor Neugebauer 

(the author quoted by Furuli) once pointed out, the common name of the 

kinglist, “Ptolemy’s Canon,” is a misnomer. This has been known for a long time. 

F. X. Kugler and Eduard Meyer, for example, pointed out long ago that the list 

had been in use for centuries before Ptolemy. (For additional details and 

documentation about this, see GTR 4 , Ch. 3, A-2.)


Strangely, but apparently unknowingly, Furuli accepts this, in contradiction 

to his strawman arguments. In the Introduction, he notes that the Ptolemaic 

scheme “fits perfectly with the theoretical eclipse scheme of Saros cycles and 

intercalary months” (pp. 13, 14), that is, the chronology of the cuneiform 

tablets from the Seleucid era (312-64 BCE) that list dates at 18-year intervals for 

earlier periods. In a later discussion of a group of such Saros texts, Furuli points 

out (p. 97) that the group of tablets he refers to gives an unbroken series of 

dates at 18-year intervals from year 31 of Darius I (491 BCE) down into the 

Seleucid era. He notes that the chronology of these tablets, if correct, would 

rule out his Oslo Chronology (with its Darius/Xerxes co-regency and its 51- 

year reign of Artaxerxes I). The chronology of the 18-year texts, Furuli admits, 

is the same as that of Ptolemy’s Canon: 

“It is quite clear that Ptolemy did not invent his chronology of kings, 

but that he built on an already accepted chronology. This chronology 

was evidently the one the scribe(s) of the Saros tablets used.” (p. 98) 

The question, then, is: Because the chronology of Ptolemy’s Canon for the 

Neo-Babylonian and Persian eras existed hundreds of years before Claudius 

Ptolemy, how can Furuli claim that “the modern view of the chronology of the 

old world builds on the writings of Claudius Ptolemy”? This claim is not true 

today, and Furuli knows it. Obviously, Ptolemy inherited his chronology from 

earlier generations of scholars, although he might have added to it by updating 

it to his own time, as scholars had done before him and as others continued to 

do after him. (GTR 4 , p. 94, note 12 with reference) Of course, this fact makes 

Furuli’s attempt to bias his readers against Ptolemy’s Canon irrelevant to the 

the question of chronology. 

When Furuli speaks of “the writings of Claudius Ptolemy” as the basis of 

the chronology of the old world, he reveals a remarkable ignorance of the 

contents of these writings. Of Ptolemy’s greatest and best known work, for 

example, Furuli says, 

“his work Almagest (Ptolemy’s canon) has tables showing Assyrian, 

Babylonian, Persian and Greek kings together with the years of their 

reigns.” (p. 70) 

Almagest contains no such things. Strangely, Furuli seems to believe that 

Almagest is identical to Ptolemy’s Canon. In Almagest, a work originally published 

in 13 volumes, Ptolemy summed up all the astronomical and mathematical 

knowledge of his time. How Furuli can confuse Almagest with Ptolemy’s Canon, 

a chronological table covering about a page (GTR 4 , Ch. 3, A-2), is puzzling. 

True, the dates of events and ancient observations found in Almagest agree 

with the chronology of the Canon and, like the Canon, it dates events from the 

beginning of the so-called “Nabonassar Era” (747 BCE). But Almagest never 

contained the Ptolemaic Canon with its chronological tables. This kinglist was included in 

another work by Claudius Ptolemy known as the Handy Tables. 

Furuli discusses at length (pp. 70-73) Professor Robert R. Newton’s claim 

that Claudius Ptolemy was a fraud, concluding that this is a problem because 

“researchers since the Middle ages … have viewed Ptolemy’s historical and


chronological statements as truth and nothing but the truth. This is the reason 

why Ptolemy’s statements are the very backbone of the modern New 

Babylonian chronology.” (p. 73) But Furuli admits that the chronology of 

Ptolemy’s Canon existed hundreds of years before Ptolemy, so how can 

accusations against Ptolemy be a problem? Whether he was a fraud or not is 

irrelevant to the evaluation of the reliability of the Ptolemaic Canon, which also, and more 

correctly, is called the Royal Canon. (See GTR 4 , Ch. 3, A-2, ftn. 21.) 

Ptolemy’s Canon—the foundation of ancient chronology? 

So what about Neugebauer’s statement that “the data from the Almagest 

provide the backbone for all modern chronology of antiquity?” The answer is 

that Furuli quotes it out of context. It appears in Neugebauer’s work, A History 

of Ancient Mathematical Astronomy, Part Three (Berlin/Heidelberg,/New York: 

Springer-Verlag, 1975, p. 1071), in a section in which Neugebauer describes 

“The Foundations of Historical Chronology.” In this section, he uses the word 

“modern” in the broader sense (i.e., the period since the breakthrough of 

modern astronomy in the 16th century). In the very next sentence, Neugebauer 

mentions the “modern scholars” who he says used Ptolemy’s dates as a basis 

for their chronology: Copernicus (1473-1543), Scaliger (1540-1609), Kepler 

(1571-1630), and Newton (1643-1727). 

Neugebauer’s statement, then, refers to the situation that has prevailed 

during the past 400 years. But he further explains that, more recently, securely 

established chronological data of ancient observations have been obtained from 

the “great wealth of observational records assembled in Babylonia during the 

last three or four centuries B.C.” These data have enabled scholars to check the 

Canon and confirm its reliability. (Neugebauer, pp. 1072, 1073) 

Some years earlier, in a review of A. J. Sachs (ed.), Late Babylonian 

Astronomical and Related Texts (LBAT) (1955), Neugebauer emphasized the 

importance of the Babylonian astronomical texts for the Mesopotamian 

chronology. Of their value for establishing the chronology of the Seleucid era, 

for example, he explained: 

“Since planetary and lunar data of such variety and abundance define 

the date of a text with absolute accuracy—lunar positions with respect to 

fixed stars do not even allow 24 hours of uncertainty which is otherwise 

involved in lunar dates—we have here records of Seleucid history which 

are far more reliable than any other historical source material at our 

disposal.” (Orientalistische Literaturzeitung, Vol. 52, Berlin, 1957, p. 133) 

A similar confirmation of the Ptolemaic chronology has been established for 

earlier periods. The editor of the above-mentioned work, Professor Abraham J. 

Sachs, who was a leading authority on the astronomical texts and also a close 

friend and colleague of Neugebauer, explains how the cuneiform sources have 

provided an independent confirmation of Ptolemy’s kinglist back to its very 

beginning, thus establishing the absolute chronology of the Babylonian, 

Persian, and Seleucid eras. In the statement quoted below, Sachs speaks of 

Ptolemy’s kinglist as “Theon’s royal list” because it has traditionally been held 

that the mathematician Theon (4th century CE) included the kinglist in his 

revision of Ptolemy’s Handy Tablets. This view has recently been questioned, so


“Theon’s royal list” could be as much a misnomer as is “Ptolemy’s Canon.” 

(Cf. Dr. Leo Depuydt in the Journal of Cuneiform Studies, Vol. 47, 1995, p. 104) 

Apart from this detail, Sachs makes the following comparison between the 

kinglist and the cuneiform sources: 

“The absolute chronology of the Babylonian first group of kings is 

easy to establish because, as has been mentioned, Ptolemy quotes the 

report of an eclipse in the time of king Mardokempados. Even more 

important, this absolute chronology has been independently confirmed 

by cuneiform texts from Babylon which contain astronomical 

observations. These number more than 1000 pieces of day-to-day 

astronomical observations of positions and phases of the Moon, 

Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, beginning around 650 B.C. 

and continuing, in increasingly dense numbers, into the first century 

before the beginning of our era. Thanks to these astronomical diaries, numerous 

overlaps with the royal list in Theon’s Handy Tables have been established, always in 

agreement. In other cases, the lengths of the reigns of individual kings in 

Theon’s royal list can be confirmed by the careful study of the dates 

given in contemporaneous economic and administrative texts found in 

Babylonia; this is possible because for parts of the period covered by the 

royal list, we have so many of these texts that they average out to one 

every few days. In this way – namely, by using Theon’s royal list, 

Babylonian astronomical diaries, and Babylonian dated tablets—one is able 

to establish with confidence the absolute chronology back to the middle of the eighth 

century B.C., i.e. the reign of king Nabonassar of Babylon.” (A. J. Sachs, 

“Absolute dating from Mesopotamian records,” Philosophical Transactions 

of the Royal Society of London, Ser. A, Vol. 26, 1971, p. 20; emphasis added) 

As Professor Sachs points out in this statement, the Royal Canon has been 

gradually replaced in recent times as the foundation of ancient chronology by 

the many native sources from Babylonia, in particular by the great number of 

astronomical cuneiform documents, which provide “numerous overlaps” with 

the Royal Canon, “always in agreement,” thereby replacing it at these many 

points. The earlier role of the Royal Canon as the foundation of ancient 

chronology has dwindled to a fraction of the period it covers. At some points, 

it is still needed as a trusted complement because of its proven reliability. 

Depuydt, a renowned Egyptologist and specialist on ancient chronology who 

has been examining the history and reliability of the Royal Canon for a long 

time, aptly describes the shifting foundation of the chronology of antiquity: 

“To the extant that the Canon’s veracity is proven as the foundation 

of first millennium B.C.E. chronology, to that extent the Canon will also 

become superfluous as a foundation. And even more remarkably, to the 

extent that its veracity is not proven, for those parts it remains 

fundamental to first millennium B.C.E. chronology.” (Leo Depuydt, 

“The Shifting Foundation of Ancient Chronology,” forthcoming in Acts 

of European Association of Archaeologists, Meeting VIII)


It is a remarkable fact that Ptolemy’s kinglist has never been shown to be 

wrong. Depuydt emphasizes this in the article quoted above: 

“Is there any chance that the Canon is false? For four centuries now, 

the Canon has been put through countless contacts with countless 

individual sources. To my knowledge, no one has ever found any serious 

reason to suspect that the Canon is not true. A kind of common sense 

about the Canon’s veracity has therefore grown over the centuries. This 

common sense guarantees, in my opinion, that the Canon will remain 

fundamental to ancient chronology.” 

Furuli’s “summary” of the secondary and tertiary sources 

On page 92, Furuli gives a summary of the secondary and tertiary sources he 

has presented: 

“In opposition to the Bible, Berossus, Polyhistor, Ptolemy and 

Syncellus II make room for only about 50 years of exile with the country 

laying desolate, while Josephus, the Talmud, Syncellus I, and 

Antiquitatum all agree on 70 years.” 

This is a strange summary. True, the chronologies of Berossus and Ptolemy 

both indicate that Jerusalem lay desolate for 48 years, whereas the figures of 

Syncellus II indicate 50 years. But the figures of Polyhistor indicate a desolation 

period of 58 years. And the claim that “Josephus, the Talmud, Syncellus I, and 

Antiquitatum all agree on 70 years” is almost totally wrong: 

(1) Josephus’ figures in Antiquities. X.xi.1-2 imply that Jerusalem lay desolate 

for 100 years. True, at some other places Josephus assigns 70 years to the 

period, but in one of them, as we saw, he dates the desolation of Jerusalem to 

the 21st year of Nabopolassar. And, in his final statement about the period, he 

says that the desolation lasted for 50 years. 

(2) The Talmud does not support Furuli. The figures he quotes from it—45 

regnal years for Nebuchadnezzar, 23 for Amel-Marduk, and no figures for the 

remaining kings—do not indicate any 70-year period. The chronological treatise 

in the Talmud known as Seder Olam, in fact, states that Judah lay desolate for 

only 52 years. This treatise is one of the oldest parts of the Talmud, supposedly 

written by Rabbi Yose in the 3rd century CE. (C. Milikowsky, Seder Olam, Vol. 

2, University Microfilm International, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1981, pp. 535, 

543) 

(3) The figures that Furuli quotes from the late kinglist Antiquitatum assign 

30 years of reign to Nebuchadnezzar, 3 to Amel-Marduk, 6 to Nergal-sharussur, 

and none to Labashi-Marduk and Nabonidus. These figures do not point 

to any 70-year period, either. 

(4) The figures of Syncellus I indicate a 67-year period of desolation. 

Furuli’s statement that these four sources “all agree on 70 years,” then, is 

demonstrably false.


The Biblical 70 years 

Furuli begins this section by stating that “the one who connects a particular 

number with the exile, is the prophet Jeremiah.” (p. 75) Earlier, on page 15, 

Furuli claimed that “some of the texts unambiguously say that Jerusalem was a 

desolate waste during these 70 years.” And on page 17 he stated that “the Bible 

… says unambiguously that Jerusalem and the land of Judah were a desolate waste 

without inhabitants for a full 70 years.” 

But this is not what Jeremiah says. The prophet directly applies the 70 years 

to the length of Babylon’s dominion over the nations, not to the length of the desolation 

of Jerusalem and the Jewish exile. This is in remarkable agreement with the 

established facts of history. Babylon’s supremacy in the Near East began with 

the final shattering of Assyrian power in 610/609 BCE and ended with the fall 

of Babylon 70 years later in 539 BCE, exactly as Jeremiah had stated: 

“these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy years.”— 

Jeremiah 25:11 (NIV) 

“When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come back to 

you and fulfill my gracious promise to bring you back to this place.”— 

Jeremiah 29:10 (NIV) 

These texts clearly apply the 70-year period to Babylon, not to Jerusalem. 

Furuli even admits this, stating that “the text does not say explicitly that it refers 

to an exile for the Jewish nation. If we make a grammatical analysis in 25:11, we 

find that ‘these nations’ is the grammatical subject, and in 29:10, ‘Babylon’ is 

the patient, that is, the nation that should experience the period of 70 years.” (p. 

75) 

Attempting to evade this undesirable conclusion, Furuli turns to the 70-year 

passages at Daniel 9:2 and 2 Chronicles 36:20, 21, stating that “the writers of 

Daniel and 2 Chronicles understood the words of Jeremiah to imply a 70-year 

exile for the Jewish nation.” After quoting the New International Version (NIV) 

for these two texts, he claims: 

“As the analysis below shows, the words of Daniel and the 

Chronicler are unambiguous. They show definitely that Daniel and the 

Chronicler understood Jeremiah to prophesy about a 70-year period for 

the Jewish people when the land was desolate.” (p. 76) 

Because Daniel and the Chronicler lived after the end of the exile, they 

knew its real length and “could interpret Jeremiah’s words correctly,” Furuli 

argues. Then he states: 

“A fundamental principle of interpretation which is universally 

accepted, is to interpret an ambiguous passage in the light of an 

unambiguous passage. In our case we have two unambiguous passages, 

namely, Daniel 9:2 and 2 Chronicles 36:21, which apply the 70 years of 

the desolate condition to Jerusalem. To start with the seemingly 

ambiguous words of Jeremiah 25:10 is to turn the matter upside down, 

because the mentioned principle is abandoned.” (p. 76)


The principle of interpretation Furuli refers to is correct. But does Furuli 

correctly use it? Is it really true that the passages at Daniel 9:2 and 2 Chronicles 

36:21 are unambiguous, whereas the statements of Jeremiah are ambiguous? A 

critical examination of Furuli’s linguistic analyses of the passages reveals that 

the opposite is true. To start with the brief references to Jeremiah in Daniel and 

2 Chronicles, as Furuli does, is really to “turn the matter upside down” and 

abandon “the mentioned principle.” This will be shown in the following 

discussion. 

The 70 years at Daniel 9:2 

In his discussion of Daniel 9:2, Furuli first presents a transliteration of the 

text, accompanied by a word-for-word translation. It is followed by a fluent 

translation, which turns out to be the Watchtower Society’s New World 

Translation (NWT, Vol. V, 1960; the rendering is the same in the revised 1984 

edition). According to this version, Daniel “discerned by the books the number 

of years concerning which the word of Jehovah had occurred to Jeremiah the 

prophet, for fulfilling the devastations of Jerusalem, [namely,] 70 years.” 

This rendering might have been changed in a new, not-yet-published, 

revised edition of the NWT. In the revised Swedish edition of the NWT 

published in 2003, the text has been changed to say that Daniel “discerned in 

the books the number of years which according to the word of Jehovah, that 

had come to Jeremiah the prophet, would be completed concerning the 

desolate state of Jerusalem, namely, seventy years.” 

Note in particular that the phrase “for fulfilling the devastations of 

Jerusalem” has been changed to read “be completed concerning the desolate 

state of Jerusalem.” This brings the rendering of the text in close agreement 

with that of the Danish linguist quoted below. 

Although Furuli repeatedly claims that Daniel unambiguously states that 

Jerusalem would be desolate for 70 years, he feels the statement needs to be 

explained. He says: 

“A paraphrase of the central part of Daniel 9:2 could be: ‘God gave 

Jerusalem as a devastated city 70 years to fill.’ There is no ambiguity in 

the Hebrew words.” (p. 77) 

But if Daniel’s statement is as clear and unambiguous as Furuli claims, why 

does he feel it needs an exposition in the form of a paraphrase? Furuli’s 

paraphrase, in fact, gives the text a meaning that neither follows from his 

grammatical analysis nor is obvious in the translation he quoted. 

The fact is that neither Jeremiah nor Daniel say that God “gave Jerusalem 

… 70 years to fill,” nor does Daniel say that “the desolation of Jerusalem would 

last 70 years,” as NIV renders the clause. Both examples are paraphrases (cf. 

GTR 4 , Ch. 5, C-3) aimed at giving the text a specific interpretation. Another 

paraphrase, based on a careful grammatical analysis of the text, points to a 

different understanding. The well-known Hebrew scholar and Bible 

commentator Dr. Edward J. Young translates the last part of the passage as “to 

complete with respect to the desolations of Jerusalem seventy years,” adding:


“The thought may be paraphrased: ‘With respect to the desolation of 

Jerusalem, 70 years must be completed’.” (E. J. Young, The Prophecy of 

Daniel, Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publ. Co., 1949, pp. 183, 184) 

In view of Daniel’s reference to and dependence on the statements of 

Jeremiah (25:12; 29:10-12), the text could as well be understood to mean that, 

with respect to the desolate state of Jerusalem, the predicted 70 years of 

Babylonian dominion must be completed before the exiles could return to 

Jerusalem to bring its desolation to an end. The grammar clearly allows this 

meaning. There is no reason to believe that Daniel reinterpreted the clear 

statements of Jeremiah, as is required by Furuli’s interpretation of the text. 

It is obvious that Daniel links the 70 years to the desolate state of Jerusalem. 

The whole discussion in GTR 4 , Ch. 5, C is based on this. But the fact that 

Daniel links or ties the one period to the other is not the same as equating or 

identifying the one with the other. To link and to equate are two different things. 

In GTR 4 , Ch. 5, C-3, ftn. 33, the following literal translation of Daniel 9:2 is 

quoted, based on a detailed grammatical analysis of the text by a Danish 

colleague of mine, who is a professional linguistic scholar with an intimate 

knowledge of Biblical Hebrew: 

“In his [Darius’] first regnal year, I, Daniel, ascertained, in the 

writings, that the number of years, which according to the word of 

JHWH to Jeremiah the prophet would be completely fulfilled, with 

respect to the desolate state of Jerusalem, were seventy years.” 

The linguist ended his analysis of Daniel’s statement by making the 

following precise distinction: 

“This statement in no way proves that Jerusalem itself would lay 

desolate for 70 years, only that this time period would be fulfilled before 

the city could be freed and rebuilt.” 

Other knowledgeable and careful Hebraists have made the same distinction. 

In a lengthy comment about Daniel 9:2, Professor Carl F. Keil pointed to the 

dependence of the wording of Daniel 9:2 on Jeremiah 25:9-12 and explained: 

“With l e mal’ot (to fulfil) the contents of the words of Jehovah, as given 

by Jeremiah, are introduced. l e chorbot does not stand for the accusative: to 

cause to be complete the desolation of Jerusalem (Hitzig), but l e signifies 

in respect of, with regard to. This expression does not lean on Jer. xxix. 

10 (Kran.), but on Jer. xxv. 12 (‘when seventy years are accomplished’). 

charabôt, properly, desolated places, ruins, here a desolated condition. Jerusalem 

did not certainly lie in ruins for seventy years; the word is not thus to be interpreted, 

but is chosen partly with reference to the words of Jer. xxv. 9, 11. Yet the 

desolation began with the first taking of Jerusalem, and the deportation 

of Daniel and his companions and a part of the sacred vessels of the 

temple, in the fourth year of Jehoiakim (606 [error for 605] B.C.). 

Consequently, in the first year of the reign of Darius the Mede over the kingdom 

of the Chaldeans the seventy years prophesied of by Jeremiah were now full, the period 

of the desolation of Jerusalem determined by God was almost expired.” (C. F. Keil, 

Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. IX, pp. 321-322; emphasis added)


Keil, one of the greatest Hebrew scholars of the 19th century, regarded this 

as a fully possible understanding of the text and quite in harmony with the 

grammar of Daniel 9:2. The explanation presented in GTR 4 is, in fact, almost 

identical to Keil’s. 

Thus, Furuli’s repeated claim that Daniel unambiguously states that 

Jerusalem was desolate for 70 years does not follow from his own grammatical 

analysis. Nor does it agree with the observations of careful Hebraists and 

linguistic scholars. 

2 Chronicles 36:20, 21: Which event fulfilled the 70 years? 

Furuli begins by presenting a transliteration of 2 Chronicles 36:21, 

accompanied by a word-for-word translation and followed by the NWT 

rendering of the text: 

“21 to fulfill Jehovah’s words by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the 

land had paid off its sabbaths. All the days of lying desolate it kept 

sabbath, to fulfill seventy years.” 

Note that this verse starts with a subordinate clause and, more specifically, 

with a purpose clause: “to fulfill ...”. What event would fulfill “Jehovah’s words 

by the mouth of Jeremiah?” To know this it is necessary to examine the main 

or principal clause. But Furuli ignores the main clause, which is found in verse 

20. This verse says: 

“20 Furthermore, he [Nebuchadnezzar] carried off those remaining 

from the sword captive to Babylon, and they came to be servants to him and 

his sons until the royalty of Persia began to reign;” 

The verse reflects the prophecies of Jeremiah about the servitude. The 

writer of Chronicles clearly has the prediction at Jeremiah 27:7 in mind: 

“And all the nations shall serve him, and his son, and his grandson, 

until the time of his own land comes.” 

After the fall of Assyria in 610/609 BCE, all the nations in the Near East 

were destined to serve the Babylonian king, his son, and his grandson as 

vassals. As Jeremiah explains in the next verse (27:8), the nation that refused to 

serve the king of Babylon was to be destroyed. The Bible as well as secular 

history show that after the battle at Carchemish in 605 BCE Nebuchadnezzar 

subjugated the nations of the Hattu area (Syria-Palestine) and forced them to 

become tribute-paying vassals. 

But the kings of Judah revolted and threw off the Babylonian yoke, which 

finally, two decades after the initial conquest, brought about the predicted 

destruction of their land and capital. The Jewish servitude, therefore, came to 

mean less than 20 years of vassal service interrupted by repeated rebellions. The rest 

of their servitude, about 49 years, had to be spent in exile in Babylonia. 

In his allusion to Jeremiah 27:7, the Chronicler does not mention “all the 

nations” but focuses only on the Jewish remnant that had been brought captive 

to Babylon after the desolation of Jerusalem. Until when would they have to 

serve the king of Babylon? As Jeremiah had said, “until the time of his own


land comes,” which the Chronicler, who wrote after the fulfillment, could make 

specific—”until the royalty of Persia began to reign”—that is, until 539 BCE. 

The Persian conquest of Babylon brought the 70 years of servitude to an end, 

in fulfillment of Jeremiah’s prophecy, as the Chronicler goes on to point out in 

the next verse—the verse quoted and discussed by Furuli out of context: 

“21 to fulfill Jehovah’s words by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the 

land had paid off its sabbaths. All the days of lying desolate it kept 

sabbath, to fulfill seventy years.” 

Which of “Jehovah’s words by the mouth of Jeremiah” were fulfilled by the 

termination of the servitude through the Persian takeover in 539 BCE? It 

cannot have been the words in the middle of the verse—”until the land had 

paid off its sabbaths. All the days of lying desolate it kept sabbath”—because 

these statements are found nowhere in the book of Jeremiah. They are actually 

references to Leviticus 26:34, 35. If, for a moment, we disregard these 

interposed statements, the Chronicler’s explanation of Jeremiah’s 70-year 

prophecy becomes clear: 

“they came to be servants to him and his sons until the royalty of 

Persia began to reign; to fulfill (l e mallôt) Jehovah’s words by the mouth of 

Jeremiah, … to fulfill (l e mallôt) seventy years.” 

The obvious meaning is that the cessation of the servitude under Babylon 

by the Persian takeover in 539 BCE fulfilled the 70-year prophecy of Jeremiah. 

The Chronicler does not reinterpret Jeremiah’s statements to mean 70 years of 

desolation for Jerusalem, as Furuli claims. On the contrary, he sticks very 

closely to Jeremiah’s description of the 70 years as a period of servitude under 

Babylon, and he ends this period with the fall of Babylon, exactly as Jeremiah 

had predicted at Jeremiah 25:12 and 27:7. 

2 Chronicles 36:20, 21: What about the sabbath rest of the land? 

Why, then, did the Chronicler insert the statements from Leviticus 26:34, 35 

about the sabbath rest of the land? Evidently because they explained why the 

land of the Jews finally had been depopulated and left completely desolated. 

According to Leviticus 26, this would be the ultimate punishment for their 

impenitent transgressions of the law, including the statute about the sabbath 

rest of the land. Jehovah said he would “lay the land desolate” and let the Jews 

be scattered “among the nations.” (Leviticus 26:32, 33) This would make it 

possible for the land to enjoy its sabbaths: 

“Then the land will enjoy its sabbaths all the days of the desolation, 

while you are in your enemies’ land; then the land will rest and enjoy its 

sabbaths.”—Leviticus 26:34, NASB. 

The Chronicler’s statement that the Jewish remnant in Babylon (in their 

“enemies’ land”) came to be servants to the kings of Babylon “until (ad) the 

royalty of Persia began to reign,” then, also implied that they served these 

Babylonian kings “until (ad) the land had paid off its sabbaths. All the days of 

lying desolate it kept sabbath.” (2 Chronicles 36:21) As noted above, the 

desolation of Judah and Jerusalem and the final deportation of “those


remaining from the sword captive to Babylon” (v. 20) occurred about two 

decades after the servitude of “all the nations” had begun. The desolated state 

of the land, therefore, did not last 70 years but somewhat less than 50 years. 

Strictly speaking, the desolation of the land did not cease until the exiles had 

returned to Judah in the late summer or early autumn (Ezra 3:1) of (most likely) 

538 BCE (GTR 4 , Ch. 3, note 2). So we must conclude that either the exiles in 

some way continued to serve the king of Babylon until 538 or that the sabbath 

rest of the land ended in 539 BCE. 

The first option seems impossible to defend. How could the exiles have 

continued to serve the king of Babylon for another year after the fall of the 

empire and the dethronement of the king in 539 BCE? Is it possible, then, that 

the sabbath rest of the land ended in 539 BCE? 

It is quite possible that the Chronicler did not regard the year of the return 

(538 BCE) as the last year of the sabbath rest of the land. It is important to 

observe that, according to the directions at Leviticus 25:4, 5, the land should 

have complete rest during a sabbatical year: 

“You shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard. You shall not 

reap the aftergrowth of your harvest or gather the grapes of your 

untrimmed vines.” 

The sabbatical years were reckoned on a Tishri-to-Tishri basis. (Leviticus 

25:9) The Jewish remnant that returned in 538 BCE arrived late in the summer 

or early in the autumn, well before the month of Tishri (as is clearly indicated at 

Ezra 3:1), which began on September 16/17 that year (PD, p. 29). Because they 

needed food for the winter, it seems likely that they immediately started making 

preparations to obtain food. They could harvest olives and fruits such as grapes 

from untrimmed vines. Grapes were valuable food because they were dried as 

raisins and used as winter food. Thus, if it is correct that they harvested food 

upon their return (which seems likely), the last year of sabbath (complete) rest 

for the land cannot have been 538 but must have been the year that had ended 

immediately before Tishri 1 of 539 BCE. This could explain why the Chronicler 

ends the sabbath rest of the land and the servitude of the exiles at the same 

time (i.e., when the Persian kingdom came to power in the autumn of 539 

BCE). 

2 Chronicles 36:20, 21: The Hebrew preposition ad—while or until? 

Furuli, of course, disagrees with the discussion above. His thesis is that the 

period of the desolation and sabbath rest of the land were identical to the 70- 

year period of Jeremiah. In his analysis, he is trying to force the Chronicler’s 

statements to conform to this theory. 

This seems to be the reason why he argues that the Hebrew preposition ad 

in the clause, “until (ad) the land had paid off its sabbaths” ... “is better 

rendered while than as until.” (p. 79) This allows him to reconstruct the verse as 

two parallels that say: 

“in order to fill the words spoken by Jeremiah, while the land kept sabbath. 

in order to fill seventy years, it kept sabbath while it was desolate.”


Furuli adds: 

“As a linguist I know by experience that language is ambiguous. But 

the words of Daniel 9:2 and 2 Chronicles 36:21 are remarkably clear and 

unambiguous.” 

It is difficult to see how this is true even of Furuli’s retranslation and 

reconstruction of the verse. As stated earlier, his analysis of verse 21 ignores the 

contextual connection with verse 20, in which we find the same preposition ad 

used in the clause “until (ad) the royalty of Persia began to reign.” Because both 

clauses with ad are aimed at explaining when the servitude ended, the 

translation of ad as “until” is the most natural in both verses. To render ad as 

“while” in verse 20, for example, would make it say that the Jewish remnant 

became servants of the king of Babylon “while the royalty of Persia began to 

reign,” a statement that is not only historically false but nonsensical. 

Most translations, therefore, render the preposition ad as “until” in both 

clauses. There are none, as far as I know, that render it “while” in the passage. 

The reason is not only that this is excluded by the context but also by the fact 

that ad seldom takes the meaning “while.” (The New Brown-Driver-Briggs-Gesenius 

Hebrew and English Lexicon,1978, p. 725) 

Furuli’s attempt to assign the meaning “while” to ad is a case of the fallacies 

of argumentation known as “special pleading” and “assuming the conclusion.” 

For his argument to work, he needs ad to mean “while;” otherwise his entire 

Oslo chronology falls apart. 

Jeremiah 25:9-12: 70 years of servitude—for whom? 

In his discussion of Jeremiah 25:9-12, Furuli focuses on verse 11, which 

says: 

“And all this land must become a devastated place, an object of 

astonishment, and these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy years.”— 

Jer. 25:11 (NIV) 

As was pointed out earlier, Furuli starts his discussion of the 70-year 

prophecy by admitting that Jeremiah applies the 70 years to Babylon, not to 

Jerusalem. As he states on page 75: 

“If we make a grammatical analysis in 25:11, we find that ‘these 

nations’ is the grammatical subject, and in 29:10, ‘Babylon’ is the patient, 

that is, the nation that should experience the period of 70 years.” 

Having concluded (falsely, as has been shown above) that Daniel 9:2 and 2 

Chronicles 36:21 unambiguously state that Judah and Jerusalem lay desolate for 

70 years, Furuli realizes that the meaning of Jeremiah 25:11 has to be changed 

to be brought into agreement with his conclusion.


The clause “these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy years” is 

very clear in Hebrew: 

weâbdû haggôyîm hâêlleh et-melech bâbel šivîm 

šânâh 

and-will-serve-they the-nations these king [of] Babel seventy 

year 

As Furuli points out (p. 82), the particle et before melech bâbel (”king of 

Babel”) is a marker indicating that melech bâbel is the object. The word order is 

typical in Hebrew: verb-subject-object. There are no grammatical problems 

with the clause. It simply and unambiguously says that “these nations will serve 

the king of Babel seventy years.” Furuli, too, admits that “this is the most 

natural translation.” (p. 84) How, then, can Furuli force it to say something 

else? 

Furuli first claims that “the subject (‘these nations’) is vague and 

unspecified.” Actually, it is not. It simply refers back to “all these nations round 

about” referred to in verse 9. Furuli goes on to state that the subject in the 

clause might not be “these nations” in verse 11 but “this land” (Judah) and “its 

inhabitants” in verse 9. Verse 11, therefore, really says that it is only the 

inhabitants of Judah, not “these nations,” that will serve the king of Babylon 70 

years. How, then, is the occurrence of “these nations” in the clause to be 

explained? Furuli suggests that they might be part of the object, the king of 

Babel, who “would be a specification of” these nations. The clause could then 

be translated: 

“and they will serve these nations, the king of Babel, seventy years” (p. 84) 

Furuli also suggests that the particle et might not here be used as an object 

marker but as a preposition with the meaning “with.” Based on this 

explanation, the clause could even be translated: 

“and they will serve these nations together with the king of Babel 

seventy years” (p. 84) 

These reconstructions are not supported by any Bible translations. Not only 

are they far-fetched, they are refuted by the wider context. The prediction that 

the nations surrounding Judah would serve the king of Babylon is repeated in 

Jeremiah 27:7 in a way that is impossible to misunderstand: 

“And all the nations must serve him and his son and his grandson 

until the time even of his own land comes.” 

The immediate context of the verse proves conclusively that “the nations” 

referred to include all the non-Jewish nations in the Near East. Furuli’s 

linguistic acrobatics, therefore, are unnecessary, mistaken, and another case of 

special pleading.


Jeremiah 25:9-12: Is the Septuagint version to be preferred? 

Furuli attempts to marshal support from the Septuagint version (LXX), 

stating that “we know that the Septuagint translators who worked with the 

book of Jeremiah in the third or second century B.C.E. used a different Vorlage 

than that of the Masoretic text [MT], perhaps a shortened form of the book.” 

(Furuli, p. 84) 

But this is not something “we know.” It is a theory suggested by some 

scholars, but there is no consensus about it. It has become popular because it is 

supposedly supported by a very fragmentary piece of a Hebrew scroll found 

among the Dead Sea Scrolls (DSS), 4QJer b . The fragment contains parts of 

Jeremiah 9:22-10:21; 43:3-9, and 50:4-6. It partially follows LXX only at 

Jeremiah 10 by omitting verses 6-8 and inserting verse 9 in the middle of verse 

5. It also contains several MT readings and also some unique readings. For 

these reasons, it cannot be said that this fragment reflects the Vorlage of LXX— 

if there ever was such a thing. As argued by M. Margaliot (”Jeremiah X 1-16: a 

re-examination,” Vetus Testamentum, Vol. XXX, Fasc. 3, 1980, pp. 295-308), 

there are strong reasons to believe that the LXX variations at chapter 10 are 

secondary and that MT here has the superior and authentic text. 

Interestingly, the five fragments of Jeremiah found among the Dead Sea 

Scrolls together contain parts of 29 of the 52 chapters of the book. These 

mainly follow MT (with some deviations), and this is also true of the preserved 

parts of chapter 25 (verses 7-8, 15-17, and 24-26). (See David L. Washburn, A 

Catalog of Biblical Passages in the Dead Sea Scrolls, Atlanta: Society of Biblical 

Literature, 2002, pp. 128-133) 

The LXX rendering of Jeremiah 25:11 makes the Jews servants among the 

nations for 70 years: 

“And all the land shall be a desolation; and they shall serve among the 

nations seventy years.” 

Strangely, the LXX leaves out all references to Babylon and King 

Nebuchadnezzar in Jeremiah 25:1-12. This creates a problem because when 

Jehoiakim had read and burned the scroll containing the prophecy a few 

months after it had been given, he asked Jeremiah, also according to Jer-LXX: 

“Why is it that you have written on it, saying: ‘The king of Babylon will 

come without fail and will certainly bring this land to ruin and cause man 

and beast to cease from it?” (Jeremiah 36:29) 

Evidently the original scroll contained references to the king of Babylon, 

which strongly indicates that Jer-MT rather than Jer-LXX represents the 

original text of Jeremiah 25:1-12. 

For additional comments about the LXX version of Jeremiah, see GTR 4 , 

Ch. 5, A, ftn. 8.

Jeremiah 29:10: The meaning of the 70 years for Babylon 


Jeremiah 29:10 explicitly states that the 70 years refer to Babylon, not 

Jerusalem: 

“This is what the LORD says: ‘When seventy years are completed for 

Babylon [l e bâbel] I will come to you and fulfill my gracious promise to 

bring you back to this place [i.e., to Jerusalem].” (NIV) 

Furuli notes that most Bible translations render the preposition le as “to” or 

“for” and that only a very few (usually older) translations render it as “at” or 

“in.” (Furuli, p. 85) Of the latter, he mentions six: NWT, KJV, Harkavy, 

Spurrell, Lamsa, and the Swedish Church Bible of 1917. 

Alexander Harkavy’s edition from 1939 contains the Hebrew text together 

with an English translation. Furuli does not seem to have noticed that Harkavy 

states in the preface that the English translation is the Authorized Version, that is, 

the KJV. George Lamsa’s translation has been strongly criticized because of its 

heavy dependence on the KJV. Also in Jeremiah, chapter 29, he almost 

slavishly follows KJV. His “at Babylon,” therefore, means nothing. I have not 

been able to check Helen Spurrell’s translation. It was published in London in 

1885, not 1985, as Furuli’ Bibliography erroneously shows, so it is not a 

modern translation. 

The Swedish Church Bible of 1917 has recently been “replaced” by two new 

translations, Bibel-2000 and Folkbibeln (1998). Both have “for Babylon” at 

Jeremiah 29:10. In answer to my questions, the translators of both translations 

emphasized that l e bâbel at Jeremiah 29:10 means “for Babylon” not “at” or “in” 

Babylon. Remarkably, even the new revised Swedish edition of the NWT has 

changed the earlier “in Babylon” in the 1992 edition to “for Babylon” in the 

2003 edition. 

Because the rendering “for Babylon” contradicts the theory that the 70 years 

refer to the period of Jerusalem’s desolation, Furuli needs to defend the notably 

infrequent rendering “at” or “in” Babylon. He even claims that the preposition 

“for” gives the 70 years “a fuzzy meaning:” 

”If ‘for’ is chosen, the result is fuzziness, because the number 70 then 

looses all specific meaning. There is no particular event marking their beginning 

nor their end, and the focus is wrong as well, because it is on Babylon rather 

than on the Jews.” (p. 86) 

This is an incredible statement and another example of Furuli’s special 

pleading. It is difficult to believe that Furuli is totally ignorant of the fact that 

both the beginning and the end of Babylon’s supremacy in the Near East were 

marked by revolutionary events—the beginning by the final crushing of the 

Assyrian empire and the end by the fall of Babylon itself in 539 BCE. Surely he 

must know that, according to secular chronology, exactly 70 years passed 

between these two events. Modern authorities on the history of this period 

agree that the definite end of Assyria occurred in 610/609 BCE. In GTR 4 , Ch. 

5, G-2, for example, four leading scholars were quoted to this effect: viz. 

Professor John Bright and three leading Assyriologists, Donald J. Wiseman, M. 

A. Dandamaev, and Stefan Zawadski. It would be easy to multiply the number.


Another example is Professor Klas R.Veenhof, who comments about the end 

of Assyria on pages 275 and 276 of his book Geschichte des Alten Orients bis zur 

Zeit Alexanders des Grossen (Göttingen, 2001). He describes how the last king of 

Assyria, Assuruballit II, after the destruction of the capital Nineveh in 612 

BCE, retreated to the provincial capital Harran, the last Assyrian stronghold, 

where he succeeded in holding out for another three years, supported by Egypt. 

Veenhof writes: 

“It was to no advantage that Egypt supported Assyria; the Babylonian 

and Median armies took the city in 610 B.C., and in the following year 

[609] they warded off their last defensive attempt. Therewith a great 

empire was dissolved.” (Translated from German) 

Realizing that the year 609 marks the natural starting point of the “seventy 

years for Babylon,” Professor Jack Finegan writes on pages 177 and 178 in the 

revised edition of his well-known Handbook of Biblical Chronology (Peabody, 

Mass.: Hendrickson Publishers, 1998): 

“In Jeremiah 29:10 the promise of the Lord is to bring the people 

back ‘when seventy years are completed for Babylon.’ In the history of 

the ancient Orient the defeat in 609 B.C. of Ashur-uballit II, ruler in the 

western city of Haran of the last remnant of the Assyrian empire, by 

Nabopolassar of Babylon, marked the end of that empire and the rise to 

power of the Babylonian empire (§430). Then in 539 Cyrus the Persian 

marched in victory into Babylon (§329) and the seventy years of Babylon 

and the seventy years of Jewish captivity were ‘completed’ (709 [printing 

error for 609] - 539 = 70).” 

Certainly, no one acquainted with Neo-Babylonian history can honestly 

claim that the 70 years “for Babylon” have a “fuzzy meaning” because no 

particular events mark the beginning and end of the period. 

Jeremiah 29:10: The Septuagint and Vulgate versions 

Furuli next points out that “the Septuagint has the dative form babylôni” but 

with “the most natural meaning being ‘at Babylon’.” The statement reveals a 

surprising ignorance of ancient Greek. As every Greek scholar will point out, 

the natural meaning of the dative form babylôni is “for Babylon.” It is an exact, 

literal translation of the original Hebrew l e bâbel, which definitely means “for 

Babel” in this text, as will be discussed below. True, at Jeremiah 29:22 (LXX 

36:22) the dative form babylôni is used in the local sense, “in Babel,” but we may 

notice that it is preceded by the Greek preposition en, “in,” to make this clear: 

“And from them a malediction will certainly be taken on the part of 

the entire body of exiles of Judah that is in Babylon (en babylôni)” 

Furuli further refers to the rendering of the Latin Vulgate, in Babylone, which 

means, as he correctly explains, “in Babylon.” This translation most probably 

influenced the KJV of 1611, which in turn has influenced several other earlier 

translations. The point is that all translations derived from or influenced by the 

Vulgate, such as the KJV, are not independent sources.

Jeremiah 29:10: The Hebrew preposition l e (lamed) 


The preposition l e is the most common preposition in the Hebrew Old 

Testament. According to a recent count, it occurs 20,725 times, 1352 of which 

are found in the book of Jeremiah. (Ernst Jenni, Die hebräischen Prepositionen. 

Band 3: Die Präposition Lamed, Stuttgart, etc.: Verlag Kohlhammer, 2000, p. 17) 

What does it mean at Jeremiah 29:10? Since the first edition of my book on the 

Gentile times (GTR) was published in 1983, this question has been asked of 

dozens of qualified Hebraists around the world. I contacted some and so did 

some of my correspondents. Although some of the Hebraists explained that l e 

in a few expressions has a local sense (”in, at”), in most cases it does not, and 

they unanimously reject this meaning at Jeremiah 29:10. Some of them are 

quoted in GTR 4 (Ch. 5, B-2). 

Furuli disagrees with their view. He believes that because l e is used in a local 

sense in some expressions at a few places it is likely used in this sense also in 

Jeremiah 29:10. He argues: 

”Can it really be used in the local sense ‘at’? It certainly can, and The 

Dictionary of Classical Hebrew lists about 30 examples of this meaning, one of 

which is Numbers 11:10, ‘each man at (le) the entrance of his tent’. So, in each 

case when le is used, it is the context that must decide its meaning. For example, 

in Jeremiah 51:2 the phrase lebâbel means ‘to Babylon’, because the preceding 

verb is ‘to send’. But lirûshâlâm [the letters li at the beginning of the word is a 

contraction of le+yod] in Jeremiah 3:17 in the clause, ‘all the nations will gather 

in Jerusalem’ has the local meaning ‘in Jerusalem’, and the same is true with the 

phrase lîhûdâ in Jeremiah 40:11 in the clause, ‘the king of Babylon had left a 

remnant in Judah’.” (p. 86) 

Well and good, but do these examples allow l e bâbel at Jeremiah 29:10 to be 

translated “in” or “at Babylon”? Is this really a likely translation? Is it even a 

possible one? This question was sent to Professor Ernst Jenni in Basel, 

Switzerland, who is undoubtedly the leading authority today on Hebrew 

prepositions. So far, he has written three volumes on three of the Hebrew 

prepositions, b e (beth), k e (kaph), and l e (lamed). In Die hebräischen Prepositionen. 

Band 3: Die Präposition Lamed (Stuttgart, etc.: Verlag Kohlhammer, 2000), he 

devotes 350 pages to the examination of l e . His answer of October 1, 2003 was: 

“As I recently have received an inquiry from Germany concerning 

Jer. 29,10 (likewise in connection with a theory of Jehovah’s Witnesses), 

I can answer you relatively quickly. 

My treatment of this passage is found in the Lamed-book p. 109 

(heading 4363). The rendering in all modern commentaries and 

translations is ‘for Babel’ (Babel as world power, not city or land); this is 

clear from the language as well as also from the context. 

By the ‘local meaning’ a distinction is to be made between where? 

(‘in, at’) and where to? (local directional ‘to, towards’). The basic meaning 

of l is ‘with reference to’, and with a following local specification it can 

be understood as local or local-directional only in certain adverbial expressions 

(e.g., Num. 11,10 [Clines DCH IV, 481b] ‘at the entrance’, cf. Lamed pp.


256, 260, heading 8151). At Jer. 51,2 l is a personal dative (‘and send to 

Babel [as personified world power] winnowers, who will winnow it and 

empty its land’ (Lamed pp. 84f., 94)). On Jer. 3,17 ‘to Jerusalem’ (local 

terminative), everything necessary is in Lamed pp. 256, 270 and ZAH 1, 

1988, 107-111. 

On the translations: LXX has with babylôni unambiguously a dative 

(‘for Babylon’). Only Vulgata has, to be sure, in Babylone, ‘in Babylon’, 

thus King James Version ‘at Babylon’, and so probably also the New 

World Translation. I hope to have served you with these informations 

and remain with kind regards, 

E. Jenni.” 

[Translated from the German. Emphasis added.] 

In view of this specific and authoritative information, Furuli’s arguments for 

a local meaning of l e at Jeremiah 29:10 can be safely dismissed. 

What about the 70 years at Zechariah 1:12 and 7:5? 

That the 70-year texts at Zechariah 1:12 and 7:5 refer to a period different 

from the one in Jeremiah, Daniel, and 2 Chronicles is demonstrated in detail in 

GTR 4 , Ch. 5, E-F. There is no need to repeat the argumentation here; most 

readers have access to this work. Furuli’s attempt to equate the 70 years in 

Zechariah with the 70 years of Jeremiah, Daniel, and the Chronicler evades the 

real problem. 

According to Zechariah 1:12, Jerusalem and the cities of Judah had been 

denounced for “these seventy years.” If this denunciation ended when the Jews 

returned from the exile after the fall of Babylon, as Furuli holds, why does our 

text show that the cities still were being denounced in the second year of 

Darius, 520/519 BCE? Furuli has no explanation for this, and he prefers not to 

comment on the problem. 

The same holds true of Zechariah 7:4, 5. How can the 70 years of fasting 

have ended in 537 BCE, as Furuli claims, when our text clearly shows that these 

fasts were still being held in the fourth year of Darius, 518/517 BCE? Furuli 

again ignores the problem. He just refers to the fact that the Hebrew verbs for 

“denounce,” “fast,” and “mourn” are all in the Hebrew perfect, stating that, 

“There is nothing in the verbs themselves which demands that the 70 years 

were still continuing at speech time.” (p. 88) True, but they do not demand the 

opposite, either. The verb forms in the passage prove nothing. 

But the context does. It clearly shows that the cities were still being 

denounced “at speech time,” in 519 BCE, and that the fasts were still being 

held “at speech time,” in 517 BCE, about 70 years after the siege and 

destruction of Jerusalem in 589-587 BCE. That is why this question was raised 

in 519 BCE: Why is Jehovah still angry at Jerusalem and the cities? (Zechariah 

1:7-12) And that is also why this question was raised in 517 BCE: Shall we 

continue to hold these fasts? (Zechariah 7:1-12) Furuli’s interpretation (which 

echoes the Watchtower Society’s) implies that the denunciation of the cities and 

the keeping of the fasts had been going on for about 90—not 70—years, 

directly contradicting the statements in the book of Zechariah.


Is Furuli’s 70-year desolation of Jerusalem supported by archaeology? 

In note 126 on page 91, Furuli indicates that his theory of a 70-year-long 

desolation period for Jerusalem is supported by archaeological findings. He 

quotes from an article written by Ephraim Stern, “The Babylonian Gap,” in 

Biblical Archaeology Review (Vol. 26:6, 2000, pp. 45-51, 76). Stern points out: 

“For roughly half a century—from 604 B.C.E. to 538 B.C.E.—there 

is a complete gap in evidence suggesting occupation.” (pp. 46-47) 

This would indicate a gap of about 68 years. But Furuli fails to explain that 

the destruction that Stern dates to 604 BCE is the one caused by the 

Babylonian armies at their first capture of Judah and the surrounding nations in 

Nebuchadnezzar’s accession and first regnal years. This is evidently the 

destruction that Jeremiah, too, refers to at 25:18 and which he, too, dates to the 

first year of Nebuchadnezzar in 25:1. Evidently the country was widely 

devastated by the Babylonian army on its first swing through Judah. (See the 

comments on this in GTR 4 , Ch. 5, A-1, ftn. 10.) Of the destruction of 

Jerusalem 18 years later—which Stern dates to 586 BCE—Stern writes: “The 

evidence of this destruction is widely confirmed in Jerusalem excavations.” (p. 

46) A careful examination of Stern’s article shows that there is nothing in it that 

supports Furuli’s views of the 70 years. This is also true of Stern’s more recent 

article on the same subject, “The Babylonian Gap: The Archaeological Reality,” 

published in the Journal for the Study of the Old Testament (JSOT), Vol. 28:3 (2004), 

pp. 273-277. 

The Biblical 70 years—Furuli’s “different approach” 

In the last few pages of chapter 4, Furuli describes his approach to the 

Biblical prophecies on the 70 years as “different.” Different how? It is different, 

he says, because he allows the Bible to take precedence over secular historical 

sources. He attempts to show this by comparing his approach with the 

discussion of the 70 years written by the Seventh Day Adventist scholar Ross 

E. Winkle. Furuli brings up Winkle’s discussion, he says, because he is the only 

scholar known to him who uses a linguistic approach to the 70-year passages: 

“The only person I am aware of who has discussed the prophecies of 

the exile from a linguistic point of view and in a scholarly way is a 

scholar writing in an Adventist periodical.” (p. 89) 

This is a gross overstatement. I have many commentaries and articles that 

discuss these passages from a linguistic point of view. Nevertheless, Winkle’s 

discussion is excellent. It was published in 1987 in the scholarly SDA 

publication Andrews University Seminary Studies (AUSS,Vols. 25:2 and 25:3). As a 

subscriber to that journal, I read Winkle’s articles in 1987 and was surprised to 

find out how remarkably similar most of his observations and conclusions were 

to my own, published four years earlier in GTR 1 . (See the comments on this in 

GTR 4 , Ch. 5, G-2, ftn. 57.) 

Furuli explains that the difference between Winkle’s approach and his own 

is that Winkle “interprets the words of Daniel and the Chronicler in the light of 

his understanding of the traditional chronology. I, on the other hand, start with 

the words of Daniel and the Chronicler, which I argue are unambiguous, and


choose the understanding of Jeremiah 25 and 29 which accords with the words 

of Daniel and the Chronicler: the traditional chronology is not taken into 

account at all.” (p. 90) Furuli then makes some comments about Winkle’s 

analysis of 2 Chronicles 36:20-22, concluding that it is “forced” and 

“unnatural” because his basis “is a faith in the traditional chronology.” (p. 91) 

This is not a fair description of either Winkle’s approach or of Furuli’s own. 

In this review of the first four chapters of Furuli’s book, we have seen a 

number of insurmountable difficulties that his Oslo Chronology creates not 

only with respect to the extra-Biblical historical sources but also with the Bible 

itself. 

The amount of evidence against Furuli’s revised chronology provided by the 

cuneiform documents—in particular the astronomical tablets—is enormous. 

Furuli’s attempts to explain away this evidence are of no avail. His idea that 

most, if not all, of the astronomical data recorded on the tablets might have 

been retrocalculated in a later period is demonstrably false. Furuli’s final, 

desperate theory that the Seleucid astronomers—and there were many— 

systematically redated almost the whole astronomical archive inherited from 

earlier generations of scholars is divorced from reality. 

With respect to the Biblical passages on the 70 years, we have seen to what 

extremes Furuli has been forced to go in his attempts to bring them in 

agreement with his theory. He has been unable to prove his repeated claim that 

the 70-year passages in Daniel and 2 Chronicles unambiguously state that 

Jerusalem was desolate for 70 years. His linguistic interpretation of 2 Chronicles 

36:21 is misconstrued because he ignores the main clause in verse 20, which 

plainly makes the servitude end at the Persian conquest of Babylon in 539 BCE. 

Furuli’s linguistic rerenderings of the passages in Jeremiah are no better. To 

reconcile Jeremiah 25:11 with his theory, he admits that he must discard “the 

most natural translation” of the verse. And to bring Jeremiah 29:10 into 

agreement with his theory, he must reject the near-universal rendering “for 

Babylon” in favor of the unsupportable “in Babylon” or “at Babylon”— 

translations rejected by all competent modern Hebraists. 

Furuli’s approach, then, is not Biblical but sectarian. As a conservative 

Jehovah’s Witness “scholar”, he is prepared to go to any length to force the 

Biblical passages and the historical sources into agreement with the Watchtower 

Society’s Gentile times chronology—a chronology that is the foundation 

cornerstone of the movement’s claim to God-given authority. As I have amply 

documented in this review, this sectarian agenda forces Furuli to invent 

incredible explanations of the relevant sources, Biblical as well as extra- 

Biblical.

A Discussion of the Biblical Material in the Book Persian 

Chronology and the Length of the Babylonian Exile of the Jews, 

by Rolf Furuli (RF), Oslo 2003. 

By Kristen Jørgensen (2004) 

[Editor’s note: Kristen Jørgensen is a professional Danish 

linguist with a sound knowledge of the Biblical languages.] 

This recent book purports to be a scientific treatment of the subject given in 

the title, by a Norwegian scholar introducing himself as a lecturer of Semitic 

languages at Oslo University. The greater part of it consists of a discussion of 

ancient Middle East chronology based on astronomical observations found on 

clay tablets and in other old written sources. However, the only part to be 

discussed here is the material found in chapter four, on pages 75-92, and in the 

abstract on page 15. A close reading of this chapter creates serious doubts 

about the intentions of the author, however, as his aim seems merely to prove 

his sectarian views about the title theme. Right from the outset it points in that 

direction, as evidenced both by the subtitles and the skewed argumentation, so 

as not to speak of the various errors and mistakes. Before going into the main 

text we may take a look at the abstract: 

The ‘Abstract’ 

This short paragraph is nothing less than presumptuous: to present categorical 

statements from the outset along with an unproven conclusion must be 

regarded as very poor method as seen from a scholarly viewpoint. Indeed, an 

abstract at the beginning of a thesis is supposed merely to present the theme 

and the problems to be treated, maybe even outlining the methods to be used 

in solving them. Any discussion of the final results should be left to a summary 

at the end, as exemplified in so many learned works. RF’s claim that there are 

six Bible passages mentioning ‘a Babylonian exile of 70 years’ is erroneous: 

there is no such passage anywhere in the entire Bible! Consequently, the rest is 

to all practical purposes quite false, simply because God’s inspired Word, the 

Bible, nowhere states explicitly how long that period was to last but leaves it to 

the reader to figure it out from the historical facts - and they fully support the 

view that the exile lasted for no more than half a century. Indeed, it is not mere 

tradition but diligent Bible scholarship in conjunction with the findings of 

archaeology, history and chronology which leads one straight to this sound 

conclusion, a fact which has been substantiated by much competent Bible 

research over the years. 

The Bible ... The subtitle on page 75 repeats the erroneous claims already 

made and so needs no further comment. However, RF’s continued 

presentation of false information without the giving of proper evidence reveals 

his purpose: he evidently wants his readers to believe these claims before any 

proof is presented! This is the method of propagandists, not of honest scholars 

who are weighing all possibilities carefully before making a decision. Now, as to 

Leviticus 26, partially quoted by RF, it is evident that punishment for idolatry in 

Israel was not just a possibility, it was a sure thing, but it is not so sure that 

Exodus 20:5 implies the same idea; after all, it says nothing about an exile and 

457


the mention of later generations may as well refer back to Genesis 15:13-16, 

whence we learn that at that time the sins of the Amorites had not yet reached 

their full measure, and so no action would be taken against them just then. 

In the latter part of the first paragraph RF tells us that ‘the captivity of the Jews 

in Babylon is spoken of as an exile’, which is hardly news, but of the three 

scriptures referred to containing the term gâlût (which may be translated 

‘captivity’, or ‘exile’, even ‘exiles’ or ‘captives’ collectively) one is slightly off: 

Jeremiah 52:32 should be 52:31. 

The final clause of this paragraph is also deceptively formed: Jeremiah 25:11 

does not connect the 70 years with the exile but with the servitude of ‘these 

nations’ under Babylon, and 29:10 clearly applies them to Babylon and to no 

one else! Actually, RF admits as much in the very first clause after the 

quotations, saying, ‘... but the text does not say explicitly that it refers to an exile 

for the Jewish nation’! Of course it doesn’t, for that simply would not have 

been true. Aside from the poor syntax of parts of these paragraphs this 

statement is a gem by which the author actually casts aspersions on his own 

argumentation right from the outset! His grammatical analysis ‘of’ (not ‘in’) 

Jeremiah 25:11 is defective: he ignores the first clause in which the subject is 

‘this whole country’, ‘will become’ is the verbal, and ‘a desolate wasteland’ is the 

subjective complement. Then, of course, ‘these nations’ is the subject of the 

latter clause, and ‘will serve’ is the verbal, while ‘Babylon’ is what is usually 

called the direct object (the term ‘patient’ used by the author belongs to the socalled 

‘Case Grammar’ and is not commonly used in connection with Hebrew 

which lost its case endings in antiquity. However, his use of it makes no 

difference whatsoever for the analysis of this Hebrew text). Moreover, he states 

quite correctly that according to the grammatical analysis ‘“Babylon“... is the 

nation that should experience the period of 70 years’, after which he blows it by 

falsely claiming that, ‘Nevertheless, the writers of Daniel and 2 Chronicles 

understood the words of Jeremiah to imply a 70-year exile for the Jewish 

nation’! Now, it may be said with absolute certainty that they could not have 

understood Jeremiah’s words to imply anything like that, simply because the 

prophet never stated that with even a single word anywhere and so, if anyone 

‘understood’ them in that way it would be either a gross error or, even worse, a 

deliberate misrepresentation of the inspired message. Barring extreme 

sloppiness on the part of the writer, the latter may well be the case! 

Really, it boggles the mind to try to fathom this claim, that two inspired 

spokesmen of Almighty God should have misrepresented the inspired words of 

another faithful servant of God, an inspired prophet who served in Jerusalem 

during one of the most turbulent periods of her history and who was faithful in 

performing the task which Jehovah had entrusted to him, despite all the 

difficulties and hardships he had to suffer for 40 years in Jerusalem and some 

time later in Egypt! This is a harsh treatment of Jeremiah, as well as of Daniel 

and the Chronicler who evidently had no difficulty in understanding Jeremiah’s 

words, as is obvious from a close reading of the scriptures in question. By the 

way, the quotation from 2 Chronicles at the bottom of page 75 is not merely 

from 36:20, but includes verse 21, even though it is not marked as such.

Sham Scholarship 459 

Actually, RF’s entire argumentation in this part of the chapter rests on a 

falsehood, a sly deception: His statement on page 76 that it ‘turns the matter 

upside down’ to begin with what he calls the ‘ambiguous words’ of Jeremiah 

25:10, is all wrong! Things are just the other way around: the one turning 

matters topsy-turvy is RF by his claiming that Jeremiah’s inspired words are 

‘ambiguous’, which they are not - indeed, there is absolutely nothing 

‘ambiguous’ or erroneous in the prophecies of Jeremiah about the fate of Judah 

and Jerusalem at the hand of the Babylonians. Apparently, RF has invented this 

postulate as an excuse for seeking a different explanation of these matters. 

Moreover, here he also shows that he is aware of the problems he is creating 

for himself, because after claiming falsely that the land was desolate for 70 years he 

says, ‘Whereas we at first glance do not understand Jeremiah 25:11 this way, 

there need not be any problem here.’ No, in this he is right, for all problems 

disappear if we ignore his attempts to twist the truth of God’s Word. This will 

be further elucidated in the analysis to be set forth here. 

No ambiguity in God’s Word 

Nonetheless, he persists in his false claims: after his quotations from 2 

Chronicles and Daniel he claims that the words of these two writers are 

‘unambiguous’ and since they ‘lived after the exile was terminated, ... they knew 

the real length of it.’ This is correct, of course, only it does not prove his 

contention for, as stated, Jeremiah’s words are as unambiguous as theirs, and 

since he received his prophetic message from Jehovah God by inspiration, it 

was utterly correct in all details. The entire argumentation found in this 

paragraph and the next two is false to the core: while it is true that in certain 

uninspired writings it may be possible to explain ambiguous passages by means 

of unambiguous ones dealing with the same subject matter, this principle is not 

applicable here, since none of the inspired scriptures dealt with are ambiguous! 

The only reason why the author claims that (thus far with no evidence at all) is 

that he clearly has an axe to grind, namely to gain support for the age-old claims 

of certain sectarian expositions made long ago by people who knew altogether 

far too little about the ancient history of Israel and her neighbouring countries 

and of the chronology of that period to deal correctly and scholarly with such 

matters. Even today their successors haven’t learned to do it properly but stick 

stubbornly to their ancient falsehoods! 

At this stage a few words may be said about these early sectarian matters, about 

which even RF may know too little: When young Charles Taze Russell, the 

founder of the movement of the Watchtower people (to whom RF belongs), 

known since the 1870’s as the Bible Students, but since 1931 as the Jehovah’s 

Witnesses, published his dogma about the ‘Gentile Times’ of Luke 21:24 as 

being a period of 2,520 years, counting from 606 BCE (much later tacitly 

‘corrected’ to 607!) to 1914 CE, he based this dating on an incorrect chronology 

used by certain small Adventist groups with which he had been associated for 

some time and from whom he had learned most of his views about ‘the last 

days’ and the beginning of ‘the millennium’, and evidently he did not try to 

find out what real scholars had to say about these subjects. Indeed, if he had 

done so, he might have learned that even before he was born historians had 

figured out a better chronology for Judah and the Neo-Babylonian empire, as


may be seen in Dr. Alfred Edersheim’s History of the Jewish Nation from the late 

19th century, in which he cites dates for the destruction of Jerusalem from 

several learned works, the earliest one of which is Dr.G.B.Winer’s Biblisches 

Realwörterbuch from 1847-48 (published four years before Russell was born!), 

which gives the year as 588 BC, while a scholar named Clinton has 587, exactly 

like modern scholars nowadays! So why did not Mr Russell look to the 

competent scholars of his day for the correct date? That would have saved him 

from many a mistake and his followers from the long series of disappointments 

which they have suffered over the years down till this very day! 

The 70 years, the desolation of the land and Daniel 9:2 

Well, back to pages 76, 77 of RF’s book where we find another slanted subtitle, 

after which he goes on to Daniel 9:2, making an analysis of the Hebrew text, 

giving a literal rendering of it and quoting the New World Translation for good 

measure (in this he cuts a corner by writing ‘70’ instead of ‘seventy’). The 

Hebrew is transliterated, but his system does not seem to conform to any of the 

well-known standard systems: it employs the letter [æ], which is only used in 

Danish and Norwegian, never in English texts; also, he does not transliterate 

the divine name as Jehovah orYahweh as is usual in English-language publications, 

but uses the Jewish substitute ‘adônay (‘‘my lord’), which is not really a 

transliteration. There are other irregularities in his system, but let this suffice for 

the moment. 

Strangely enough, in his grammatical analysis he does not deal with the Hebrew 

text but with the secondary English rendering, except for the tiny preposition le, 

which he somehow maltreats together with the verb with which it is connected. 

Also, it is incomplete, as he omits the initial time adverbial (bishenat ‘achat 

lemâlekho, ‘in year one of his reign’) and the rest is defective - e.g., the subject in 

the first part of the sentence is not just ‘Daniel’, but in Hebrew‘ani Dâniêl, 

rendered in NW ‘I myself Daniel’, the inclusion of the personal pronoun ‘ani 

(‘I’) showing that the subject is emphatic - Daniel had checked matters for 

himself in ‘the Scriptures’. He also omits the quite important adverbial 

bassepârim (‘in the Scriptures’) which shows that the aging Daniel did not waste his 

time but checked the inspired Scriptures at once when the time was up. The 

definition of the direct object (DO) is somewhat incorrect, too: first come the 

core words mishpar hashânim (‘number of years’), followed by an embedded 

relative clause,‘asher hâyâh debhar-YHWH ‘el-Yirmiyâh-hanâbhî (‘which gave word 

of Yahweh to Jeremiah the prophet’). Finally, the last part of the DO is the 

clause lemall’ôt lechorebhôt Yerûshalâyim shibhim shanâh, in which lemall’ôt is the 

infinitive, le being the infinitive marker and the verb mal’e (‘to fill, fulfill, 

complete’) is in the timeless and intensive piel conjugation (‘in order to fully 

complete’), while lechorebhôt Yerûshâlayim is a prepositional phrase functioning as 

an adverbial (‘in regard to/for Jerusalem’s desolations’), and lastly, shibhim 

shanâh, (‘seventy years’) is the direct object. RF’s analysis of the word lemall’ôt, 

i.e., that ‘the preposition plus infinitive serves as a temporal accusative whose 

adjunct is 70 years’, for which he refers to Ronald J. Williams’ Hebrew Syntax An 

Outline (2nd ed. Toronto U.P. 1976, p. 48, § 268) for proof, is in error; indeed, if 

he had studied the paragraph referred to and the references from it in detail he


would have noted that le does not function in that way except when directly 

connected with a term expressing some time element, as in Williams’ examples, 

e.g. 2 Chronicles 11:17, leshanim shalosh (‘for three years’). 

Thus, the prepositional phrase lechorebhôt Yerûshalâyim, ‘for desolations of 

Jerusalem’ functions as an adverbial indicating the purpose intended, namely to 

fix the absolute end of the desolations of Jerusalem, i.e., when the 70 years ‘for 

Babylon’ were to end. As for RF’s little comparison with a ‘simpler clause’, it is 

really of no value at all, and that goes for his paraphrase, too. The framed 

statement in bold-faced type is rather irrelevant: true, there is no need to take 

the word chorebhôt (fem. plur., construct) to signify several desolations of 

Jerusalem, but neither is it logical to apply it to ‘the many ruins of the city’, 

because in Hebrew the so-called plural form may also signify fulness, intensity, 

magnitude, extension and similar concepts, according to the context, and here it 

is most likely used to show that the full and complete desolation of Jerusalem 

would end exactly at the time designated by Jehovah himself, as made known 

through his prophet Jeremiah. (Cf. Johs. Pedersen, Hebræisk Grammatik, 

Copenhagen 1926, pages 197, 198, § 115) However, we ought to note that RF 

correctly connects the complete desolation of Jerusalem with the final conquest 

by the Chaldeans (in 587 BC, not 607), but he errs again when he stubbornly 

sticks to a ‘period of 70 years’ for the Jewish exile, even though he is not able to 

present any real evidence, simply because there is none. Let us just see how 

NASB renders Daniel 9:2: 

in the first year of his reign I, Daniel, observed in the books the number of 

the years which was revealed as the word of the LORD to Jeremiah the 

peophet for the completion of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely, seventy 

years. – Cf. also RV, ASV, RSV, AAT, Moffatt, Amplified, Rotherham. 

Please note the fine wording ‘for the completion of the desolations of Jerusalem, 

namely seventy years’: here the emphasis is placed where it belongs, namely on 

the latter part of the period of desolations, when it is to be completed. Here many 

others have failed in exactly the same way as RF, taking the period of seventy 

years to signify the total number of years of the exile; a clear example of this 

grammatical error in a modern translation may be seen in The Good News Bible: 

In the first year of his reign, I was studying the sacred books and thinking 

about the seventy years that Jerusalem would be in ruins, according to what 

the LORD had told the prophet Jeremiah. – Cf. also NEB, NAB, and 

NASB. 

Interestingly, the GN-Bible renders some of the parts excellently, such as ‘I was 

studying the sacred books’, because no doubt that was what Daniel was doing; 

naturally, this high official of the Babylonian government had copies of the 

sacred books for his own private use, including the prophecy of Jeremiah, thus 

being able to make sure of these things, for which he had waited a lifetime! But 

modern scholars who do not really believe in the inspiration and the complete 

integriity of the Bible unfortunately distort parts of it, as may be seen in the 

translations here referred to.


2 Chronicles 36:21 

Going on to this scripture (pp.78-80), RF transliterates-cum-translates the 

Hebrew in the same imperfect way as before, quoting the quite imprecise NWT 

to boot; indeed, if he had used the more recent NIV he might have imparted a 

better understanding to his readers. For the sake of completeness we may begin 

with verse 20 which gives us the necessary background knowledge (NIV): 

He [Nebuchadnezzar] carried into exile to Babylon the remnant who 

escaped from the sword, and they became servants to him and his sons 

until the Kingdom of Persia came to power. 

Now, in this there is no mention of the number of years that this exile was to 

last, neither is its beginning dated; however, as to the latter point it is clearly 

shown that it would only begin after the putting of the enemies in the city to 

the sword, which happened in 587 BCE; and as to the former point we learn 

that it would end when Persia took over from Babylon, that is, in 539 BCE. 

This is in full agreement with Jeremiah’s statement, and does in no way 

contradict his inspired prophecy. 

Then, in verse 21, the Chronicler introduces a new element of which Jeremiah 

had said nothing, namely that during the exile of the Jews the land had enjoyed 

its rest as had been prophesied long ago in Leviticus 26:15-35; also, he points 

out that this would last until it had ‘paid off its sabbaths’. As the law of God 

stated in Leviticus 25, each seventh year was a sabbath year of rest during 

which the land was to lie fallow, and each fiftieth year was to be a Jubilee year 

of liberty in which the land should also remain fallow. However, Jeremiah never 

referred to these parts of the law with a single word, a fact to be kept in mind 

when dealing with verse 21, especially the latter part of it: 

The land enjoyed its sabbath rests; all the time of its desolations it rested, 

until the seventy years were completed in fulfilment of the word of the 

LORD spoken to Jeremiah. 

Please note that the text does not say, ‘all the seventy years for Babylon it rested’, 

which would have been erroneous; what it does say is that the land ‘rested’ until 

the seventy years mentioned by Jeremiah (‘for Babylon’) ‘were completed’ - and 

since Jeremiah never mentioned the sabbath rest in any of his prophecies, the 

part of verse 21 dealing with that cannot be included in the reference to ‘the 

word of the LORD spoken to Jeremiah’! The only part to be included in this 

reference is the one about the ‘seventy years’ allotted to or ‘for Babylon’, during 

which ‘these nations’ (defined in 25:9 as ‘all these nations round about’ of 

which there is an extensive list in 25:17-26) were to serve the kings of the then 

world power. Consequently, the ‘exposition’ made by RF is patently false as far 

as the Chronicler’s understanding of Jeremiah’s prophecy is concerned. 

How about the accents? 

Then, on page 79 RF directs our attention to the fact that in the Masoretic text 

certain accents are used to mark the middle of verse 21, dividing it into two 

sentences (better, ‘clauses’) and then also to mark the middle of each of these 

two parts. Now, this is quite correct - for a fact, there are no less than fourteen 

accent marks in this verse, although they do not all have the same significance.


As it is, RF does not identify the accents in question, which are 1) the ‘atnach 

(Ù), seen under the penultimate syllable in the word shabbetoteyha, and the zaqeph 

qaton (:), to be seen over the penultimate syllables of the words Yirmeyahu and 

shabhatah. The first one is commonly styled a ‘verse divider’, and is thought to 

represent as a punctuation mark either a comma or a semicolon, according to 

the length and structure of the verse, and the latter one is regarded as a less 

powerful sign, no more than a comma and maybe not even that. However, as 

far as the semantic contents of the verse and its proper interpretation are 

concerned, these signs have no authority whatsoever, and RF’s attempt to 

utilize them for that purpose is quite futile. 

As it is, these accents were invented long after the inspired consonantal Hebrew 

texts were written down: according to the textual critics they were added by the 

so-called Masoretes (8th-10th century CE) who also invented the vowel points 

to indicate the traditional pronunciation of the sacred texts. These signs were 

applied, first and foremost, as accent marks, to indicate the stress and rhythm 

to be applied to the words and phrases in public reading. Even at that, neither 

they nor the vowel points were ever used in the most sacred of all the scrolls, 

those used for public reading in the synagogues. They are quite useful, however, 

as they show textual scholars how the ancient consonantal Hebrew manuscripts 

were read and understood by the Jewish scholars of the Tiberian school who 

furnished them with vowel points and accent marks. This is a well-known fact, 

of course, but these signs are never used by reputable Hebrew scholars in the 

way suggested by RF. In this paragraph and note 118 he actually commits 

another real blunder, when he tries to make out that the lines of this verse form 

a parallelism! Let’s just take a closer look at this strange contention: 

Is there a parallelism? 

RF postulates that the four parts into which he divides verse 21 ‘speak about 

the same thing’, putting b) and c) together, although his idea about viewing the 

sabbaths from different angles seems rather strange; indeed, they do not, but 

even if they did, we must remember that in true Hebrew parallelisms different 

viewpoints on the matters discussed are quite common and simply make for 

variations of style. What he fails to see, however, is what has just been pointed 

out, namely that in Jeremiah’s prophecy referred to here there is no mention of 

a sabbath rest, and so that feature cannot be part of any exposition of his 

prophecy. For the very same reason his statement that since the accents seem 

to place a) and b) together they are to be regarded as one unit is in error 

semantically, and again, RF’s part b) of the verse has nothing to do with the 

fulfilment of Jeremiah’s prophecy! Actually, the putting together of a) and d) 

would have been a better idea semantically, since both mention the fulfilling of 

Jeremiah’s prophecy, but this will not do stylistically, since parallel elements 

must stand parallel, in successive lines. And when he then makes his rephrased 

‘parallels’, in which the order is a), b), d), and c), he muddles his own exposition 

well and truly, because this is quite impossible semantically and stylistically. 

Actually, the structure of this verse may be regarded quite differently, as a) and 

d) both refer to the fulfilment of Jehovah’s prophecy about the seventy years as 

spoken by Jeremiah, and so they may be seen as belonging together in their 

reference; b) and c) then stand as an embedded addition from the hand of the


Chronicler, quite likely because he wants to remind his readers of the 

catastrophe which had befallen the Judeans because they had neglected to keep 

Jehovah’s commandments about these matters, and maybe also because in the 

days after the homecoming and the restoration of the walls of Jerusalem by 

Nehemiah they had again begun to violate the sabbath in various ways, maybe 

even the sabbatical years, although this is not mentioned. – Nehemiah 13:15- 

22. 

Another failure of his, indeed, the initial one, is however a very common one 

with amateurs and those with an axe to grind, namely that he has separated this 

verse from its context, in this case from the preceding verse (20) which I 

included above. For a fact, the connection is easily seen, because the entire 

contents of that verse, about Nebuchadnezzar carrying the remnant which had 

escaped the sword off to Babylon to be servants of him and his sons after him, 

until the kingdom of Persia came to power, is evidently what is referred to in 

the first part of verse 21, as it says literally, ‘to fulfill word of Yahweh by mouth 

of Jeremiah’ (Kohlenberger’s literal translation). To that part may then be 

added RF’s part d) about the seventy years which Jeremiah had said were ‘for 

Babylon’. Thus we have a fine statement by the Chronicler about the prophecy 

of Jeremiah, into which he puts his own explanatory addition about the 

fulfilment of the ancient prophetic threat from the Mosaic law about the 

sabbath rest for the land during the enforced exile of the people in the land of 

the enemy. 

As shown above, RF’s claim that 2 Chronicles 36:21 is a parallelism is in error, 

which anyone even superficially acquainted with this form of Hebrew style 

would realize, first of all simply because the entire chapter of which this verse is 

a part is composed in plain prose, and Hebrew parallelisms only occur in 

poetry! From the time of Bishop Lowth who first of all Westerners described 

this feature of Old Testament poetry it has been customary to classify 

parallelisms according to their contents and style. Actually, the only type in 

which successive lines ‘say the same thing’, as RF claims for parts of verse 21, is 

the one called ‘Synonymous Parallelism’, of which we may quote a typical 

example as rendered in Ps. 149:2, NIV: ‘Let Israel rejoice in their Maker, let the 

people of Zion be glad in their King.’ In this ‘Israel’ corresponds to ‘the people 

of Zion’, ‘rejoice’ corresponds to ‘be glad’, and ‘their Maker’ to ‘their King.’ 

Thus these two lines constitute a perfect ‘synonymous parallelism’, because 

both parts express exactly the same thought, howbeit with different words. This 

type is found time and again in all the poetic writings of the Hebrew Bible, also 

in quite a few of the prophetic ones, as may be seen in the tripartite example 

from Jeremiah 10:10, NIV: ‘But the LORD is the true God; he is the living 

God, the eternal King.’ 

The fact that this verse is not a parallelism is also shown by the very accents 

which RF used in his argumentation: In the Hebrew Bible there are two 

systems of accents, one for prose and another one for poetry, that is, some of 

the marks are used in both systems, but in different ways - and the accents to 

which he referred and their use as mentioned by him show that he has in mind 

the ones used in prose texts! Also, one well-known feature of the ancient 

Hebrew manuscripts is that prose is always written in lines of even length, but 

poetry is written as verse in uneven lines, according to the sense, as may even


be seen in some modern translations, e.g. in the NIV, where Jeremiah’s poetic 

parts are printed like that; this is however ignored in many Bible translations, 

such as in the NW-Bible. 

How are these verses to be translated? 

Let us, for the sake of completeness, just take a closer look at the two verses we 

are dealing with, to see how they are composed; this example is taken from 

NIV (emphasis added), 

20 He carried into exile to Babylon the remnant who escaped from the 

sword, and they became servants to him and his sons until (‘ad) the kingdom 

of Persia came to power. 21 The land enjoyed its sabbath rests; all the time 

of its desolation it rested, until (‘ad) the seventy years were completed in 

fulfilment of the word of the LORD spoken by Jeremiah. 

Please note that the particle ‘ad (‘until’) is used not only where RF incorrectly 

wants to render it while (v. 21), but also in the phrase ‘until the kingdom of 

Persia came to power’ (v. 20), in which it would be impossible to render it 

‘while’, and it is only logical to regard it as having been used in the same sense 

in both verses. As shown by his context, RF’s reason for rendering it ‘while’ is 

apparently that he dislikes the usual term ‘until’ being used here, ostensibly 

because it does not fit his prejudiced ideas. This particle ‘ad has as its basic 

meaning ‘(continuation, duration), as far as, unto’, (Gesenius-Kautzsch-Cowley, 

Hebrew Grammar, § 103 o) as it ‘indicates the distance from, the approach 

towards’, i.e. ‘until’. According to the Hebrew-German Handwörterbuch by 

Gesenius-Buhl (pages 563-565), the sense is ‘bis, bis zu, haüfig mit Einschluss 

des Zielpunktes ... so daß der Zielpunkt als erreicht vorgestellt w(ird)’; that is, 

the distance or time indicated by ‘ad is viewed as ‘reaching from the starting 

point to and including the point aimed at.’ See also the Hebrew and English 

Lexicon by Brown, Driver and Briggs, pages 723-725, where we find similar 

definitions by Dr. Samuel Rolles Driver (who handled the treatment of all 

particles expertly in that work) in full accord with its basic semantic content. 

This accords fully with its use in 2 Chronicles 36:20, 21, where it is normally 

rendered ‘until’ by modern translators, also where RF wants to make it mean 

‘while’, which will not do, because here there is no element necessitating a 

departure from the usual sense of the word. True, the lexicon lists ‘while’ as a 

possible meaning of it, but in BDB page 725 Dr. Driver tells us that it occurs 

only rarely in that sense and he gives us no reason to accept RF’s aberrant 

views. As it is, in 2 Chronicles 36:21 we find that all English versions render it 

‘until’, and the German ones ‘bis, bis zu’, while in other languages we find 

words of exactly the same meaning, such as ‘indtil’ in Danish, ‘til’ in Norwegian 

and ‘till’ in Swedish. As for the meaning ‘while’, I haven’t been able to find a 

single translation using that in 2 Chronicles 36:21. 

Finally, we may as well discard RF’s German ‘example’ (which seems to be 

taken from a bad joke) and rewrite the framed text printed in bold-face type on 

page 80 to bring it into accord with the truth of God’s Word, the Bible:


“The words of Jeremiah 25:11, 29.10, Daniel 9:2 and 2 Chronicles 

36:20, 21 are all clear and unambiguous: Judah and Jerusalem were 

to become desolate and remain in this condition from the final 

destruction of the city in 587 BCE until the end of the 70 years ‘for 

Babylon’, which period ended in the year 539 BCE, when Babel fell to 

Medo-Persia.” 

This is what the Bible and history, supported by chronology and archaeology, 

agree on in all details. 

What was the objective of Jeremiah? 

This is RF’s next subtitle, and the rest of page 80 and the better part of page 81 

are filled with his speculations along the twisted and contorted trail he has 

chosen to follow. Really, it is not necessary to speak of the prophet’s objective 

at all beyond his strong desire to complete the task his heavenly father had 

given him, about which we read in Jeremiah 1:4-10, NW, from which we may 

learn of Jehovah’s objective in appointing Jeremiah as his prophet in Jerusalem: 

“Before I was forming you in the belly I knew you, and before you 

proceeded to come forth from the womb I sanctified you. Prophet to the 

nations I made you.’ ... to all those to whom I shall send you, you should go; 

and everything that I shall command you, you should speak. ... Here I have 

put my words in your mouth. See, I have commissioned you this day to be over the 

nations and over the kingdoms, in order to uproot and to pull down and to 

destroy and to tear down, to build and to plant.” (emphasis added; cf. vss. 

11-19) 

Actually, that is how Jeremiah’s task has been understood by Bible scholars at 

all times, not only by Christian ones, but also Jewish ones, such as Dr. Joseph 

Klausner who wrote about Jeremiah that he 

‘intervenes in the political life of his nation, contending not only with priests 

and popular teachers, but also with kings and princes, prophesying not only 

against Judah and Jerusalem, but also against the Gentiles and foreign powers, and the 

whole of the then known world, enfolding them all in his all-embracing grip, and 

scrutinizing them with the acute vision of the eagle.’ – Jesus of Nazareth, 

translated by H. Danby, London 1929. (Page 390, emphasis added) 

Being a priest himself Jeremiah knew the law well and so he was no doubt 

familiar with the contents of Leviticus, the volume that more than any other 

part of the Mosaic law addressed the priests, and quite naturally he would also 

know the contents of chapter 26 with all its promises of rewards for 

faithfulness and dire threats about punishment for disobedience. However, 

even at that he never quotes from this chapter, and even though he in his 

prophecies mentions the Judean exile reasonably often he never connects it 

with a sabbath rest for the land. So, RF’s claim about Leviticus 26 being the 

‘theme’ of Jeremiah’s book and his ‘point of departure’ doesn’t hold water, it is 

as farfetched as the other parts of his homespun yarn. Actually, the Bible itself 

furnishes some very clear evidence about the text from which the Chronicler 

took the parts of his statement about the ‘sabbath rest’ mentioned in 

connection with Jeremiah’s prophecy: the relevant words in 2 Chronicles 36:21 

are shown here, followed by the corresponding ones from Leviticus 26:34, 35:

‘ad-ratsetah ha’arets ‘et -shabbetoteyha kol-yemey hashammah shabbatah 


until-she-enjoyed the-land her-sabbaths all-days to-be-desolate she-rested 

‘az tirtseh ha’arets ‘et-shabbetoteyha ...kol-yemey hashammah tishebat 

then she-will-enjoy the-land her-sabbaths ...all-days to-be-desolate she-willrest 

These statements are nearly identical, the only differences being found in the 

words expressing time, namely the two introductory particles and the tenses of 

the first and the last verb in each of them: in Leviticus the first particle is‘az, an 

adverb signifying ‘then’, here clearly referring to the future, while the Chronicler 

has‘ad, a preposition meaning ‘until’, pointing back in time. Both use the same 

verbs, in almost the same grammatical form, namely qal, 3rd prs sg fem, the 

only difference being in the tense; the first verb is ratsah (‘to enjoy’), for which 

Leviticus has the future tirtseh (‘she will enjoy’), while the Chronicler has the 

preterite ratsetah (‘she enjoyed’), signifying the past. Then the final verb is 

shabbat, (‘to rest’), with the Chronicler it is in the preterite, shabbatah, (‘she 

rested’), while in Leviticus it is tishebat (‘she will rest’), in the future tense. The 

subjects, the direct objects and the time adverbials, also the verbs following 

(hashammah, ‘to be desolate’) are identical in both clauses. 

There can be little doubt that the Chronicler had both the prophecy of 

Jeremiah and the book of Leviticus to hand when he penned the last chapter of 

his book, and it is interesting to see how he took exactly the relevant parts of 

Leviticus 26:34, 35 and added them to his own statement in 36:21 which 

included the information from Jeremiah, who, however, had nothing from 

Leviticus at all. 

RF’s parallels 

Alas, on page 80 RF persists in his stubbornness, stating quite untruthfully that 

‘Jeremiah was the first to mention an exile of 70 years’ which he was not, for 

neither he nor anyone else did that! He mentioned the seventy years, also the 

exile and its end, but neither he nor any other prophet stated in just so many 

words that that exile would last 70 years! Apparently we have to repeat that 

statement time and again, because RF stubbornly refuses to admit that simple 

truth! Then, in the last passage before RF’s ‘parallels’ we note a printing error in 

the third line from the bottom, where ‘lead’ should read ‘led’. As for the many 

scriptures he has selected for these ‘parallels’, there is of course nothing wrong 

with them, only they do not prove his contentions, which of course couldn’t be 

expected. 

However, let us take a look at these parallels in which he compares verses from 

Jeremiah with verses from Leviticus: first, we note that not one of the verses 

here taken from Jeremiah contains a literal quotation from Leviticus! They even 

seem to have been chosen rather haphazardly, as though RF has merely picked 

them out at random from a concordance, with no proper study of their 

contents, to wit: 

In the first one, Jer. 11:10 vs Lev. 26:14, the latter ought to have been or at least 

included verse 15, and the next one, Lev. 26:31, should have been or included


verse 32; then, Jer. 14:1 ought to have been 14:1-7, and the next to last actually 

spoke of, not just pestilence, but included sword and famine in the punishment 

to be meted out. Finally, the sixth and last one is a real howler: RF’s ‘text’ says, 

‘the holy place would be destroyed.’ Now, at this stage of Judean history this 

could mean only one thing, the temple of Jerusalem; however, Leviticus 26:31, 

32 does not say anything about that place (nor about the tabernacle, for that 

matter), instead we find a prophecy against Israel’s false worship and the 

punishment for it, which would hit their ‘high places’, their ‘incense altars’ and 

their ‘lifeless idols’, also their ‘sanctuaries’, no doubt the kind spoken against in 

Amos 4:4, 5; 5:5; 7:9 and 8:14! Worse still for RF, Jer. 22:5 does not refer to 

‘the holy place’, but to ‘the king’s house’, the royal palace in Jerusalem! – Jer. 

22:1-5. 

Actually, any really diligent study of these matters could easily have produced 

many more excellent verses to be used here, but once more RF has been too 

sloppy in his research. Obviously, he is not interested in getting at the truth, the 

whole truth and nothing but the truth, but only at connecting his erroneous 

views with the idea of 70 years for the exile and the sabbath rest of the land, a 

fact becoming even more obvious when his list of twelve quotations from 

Jeremiah 4:7 to 44:22 presented on page 81 is checked: As it is, there is nothing 

strange in these scriptures – after all, Jeremiah had been given the task of 

prophesying about these events and that he did faithfully, which was his true 

objective. This becomes even clearer when we realize that all but one of these 

statements are parts of ‘messages from Jehovah’, and the one exception, the 

very last one, is from Jeremiah’s speech to the Jewish remnant on the basis of 

just such a message! Also, we know that he was not the first to speak in this 

vein: Isaiah had in his time spoken just as candidly, Micah had spoken up in the 

same manner, and so had others during the years of increasing idolatry. As it 

was, however, Jeremiah was the man on the spot: he was in Jerusalem where 

the action was, serving for an entire generation right to the end - and when the 

Babylonians offered him to go with them in safety to Babylon, he stayed on in 

the city and he even served with the remnant of the people in Egypt for some 

time. – Jer. chapters 40-51. 

A faulty list of quotations 

Then, on page 81 we find some more peculiarities: first, according to RF 

himself these quotations are taken from NWT, i.e., the Watchtower Bible, but 

they are not, they are all straight from the NIV! The first three seem to be 

defective in semantic content, as the writer does not include any reason for the 

severe threats uttered, and the same can be said about 25:18, which starts in the 

middle of a judicial statement, so that the reader will have to find out for 

himself what the culprits mentioned have done to deserve the punishment with 

which they are threatened. Also, in the last clause of 9:11, NIV has ‘so that noone’, 

while RF merely has ‘so no one’. The same error occurs further down, in 

the rendering of 34:22. Moreover, the fifth one is not from 9:22 but is a partial 

repetition from 9:11! Then in 33:10 RF breaks off his quote in the midst of a 

clause, so that we do not get to know ‘what will be heard once more’ – actually, 

he should have included verse 11 to make this quotation a complete and natural 

one. The next one, purportedly from 33:12, is not from that verse but is a short


repetition from verse 10, and in the quoted part of 34:22 we are not told what 

the ‘it’ is that is to be destroyed so thoroughly – that item, mentioned no less 

than three times, is ‘this city’, Jerusalem, as shown in verses 18-22b. It is 

extremely difficult to take the work of RF seriously! 

At that time Jehovah had wisely placed three trusted and faithful prophets in 

strategic positions for his purpose: the priest Jeremiah in the midst of 

Jerusalem, close to the king, the leaders and the priests; Ezekiel, also a priest, 

was with the exiles in faraway Babylon, and Daniel and his three friends, all of 

them from the royal tribe of Judah, in the heart of the world empire, in Babylon 

the capital, where they even had the ear of the king, the one called ‘my servant’ 

by Jehovah himself. (Jer. 25:9; 27:6) Now, if RF really had in mind to paint a 

true picture of the situation for Judah and Jerusalem in those fateful days, the 

historical and the prophetic books furnish enough material for that purpose. 

Apparently he does not have that in mind, however, and so when he turns to 

Jeremiah 25:11 and 29:10, it is seemingly in order to find some much needed 

support for his views by means of a grammatical analysis. Let’s see how he goes 

about this intricate task (pages 81-87). 

Jeremiah 25:11 

In the paragraphs leading on to RF’s transliteration-cum-translation of this 

verse he is back in his cantankerous mood, questioning the renderings of NIV, 

NW and other modern translations, raving about the structure of the verse, 

suggesting as possible ‘solutions’ to his hypothetical ‘problems’ either a 

different sense of the Hebrew or the acceptance of the rendering of the LXX; 

none of these options seems feasible, though, because in spite of RF’s 

imaginings the Hebrew text is clear and unambiguous, while the LXX evidently 

is deficient in this case. This is clear even from RF’s slightly skewed rendering, 

both his transliteration and the translation of the words and phrases; a more 

precise literal translation of the Hebrew would go like this: 

11 and-she-will-become all-the-land the-this to-(a)-waste to-(a)- 

desolation 

and-they-will-serve the-nations 

seventy year(s) 

the-these king-(of) Babylon 

As this verse is part of a larger passage (Jer. 25:8-14), the first item is the usual 

Hebrew conjunction ve- (‘and’) prefixed to the verb in the usual way. Since 

Hebrew verbs can express number and person of the action described they 

actually also express the subject, as seen here; however, when there is also an 

overt subject they will of course be in agreement grammatically: thus the ‘she’ 

of the first phrase (ve - plus the Hebrew verbal) is in agreement with the overt 

subject, ‘all the land the this’ (in Hebrew,‘erets, ‘land’, is feminine). The last two 

phrases of the first line constitute the subjective complement, showing what 

‘the land will become’, the use of two synonymous phrases expressing 

emphasis. In the second line the syntax is equally natural: beginning with the 

conjunction ve- (‘and’), followed by the verbal with an implied subject, fully 

agreeing in its grammatical form with the overt subject, both being masculine 

plural and the overt subject very emphatic with its postpositive double 

determination. The direct object is ‘king of Babylon’, the time adverbial


expressing the time limit for the service of ‘these nations’ to ‘(the) king of 

Babylon’, namely ‘seventy years’. It is all very clear and unambiguous, and it is 

almost impossible to imagine that anyone would try to pervert the sense of this 

short verse. RF hasn’t given up having his way; though, even though he admits 

that he understands quite well what ‘the natural analysis would be’ (at least of 

the latter part), and he even shows what it ought to be. Nevertheless, he doesn’t 

accept it, but tries to circumvent it in his own devious way. Let us take a close 

look at things. 

Who, indeed, are ‘the nations these’? 

Even though RF quite correctly identifies the subject, the verbal and the direct 

object of the latter clause of Jeremiah 25:11, and mentions the ‘different 

nations’ and ‘all these nations around’ several times (cf. page 82, 83) he tries 

again to muddy the waters by calling the statement in Jer. 25:11 about ‘these 

nations’ as servants of the king of Babylon ‘vague and unspecified’, and on page 

84 he speaks about them as ‘some undefined nations’. Actually, this is not only 

incorrect, it is incredibly naïve, for ‘these nations’ are certainly neither 

‘undefined’ nor ‘unspecified’ - they are even ‘specified’ in the very chapter of 

Jeremiah under discussion: first, we read in verse 9 that Jehovah would send 

‘and take all the families of the north ... even [sending] to Nebuchadrezzar the 

king of Babylon and I will bring them against this land and against its 

inhabitants and against all these nations round about’’ (emphasis added). Moreover, 

we do not need to be in doubt as to their identity, for in the very same chapter, 

in verses 17 to 26, they are ‘specified’ very detailedly: First, Jeremiah tells how 

he is to make ‘all the nations to whom he [Jehovah] sent me drink the cup of his 

wrath’, and after having mentioned Jerusalem and the towns of Judah and their 

rulers, he begins in the south and then goes on listing all the neighbouring 

nations, to the west, north and east, ‘all around’ the land of Israel. Please consult 

a good Bible Atlas for this (NIV; emphasis added): 

Pharaoh, king of Egypt, his attendants, his officials and all his people, and 

all the foreign people there; all the kings of Uz; all the kings of the 

Philistines (those of Ashkelon, Gaza, Ekron, and the people left at Ashdod); 

Edom, Moab and Ammon; all the kings of Tyre and Sidon: the kings of the 

coastlands across the sea; Dedan, Tema, Buz and all who are in distant 

places; all the kings of Arabia and all the kings of the foreign people who 

live in the desert; all the kings of Zimri, Elam and Media; and all the kings 

of the north, near and far, one after the other – all the kingdoms on the face 

of the earth. And after all of them, the king of Sheshach [Babel] will drink it 

too. 

Really, for anyone to call this lot ‘unspecified’ or ‘undefined’ is truly 

nonsensical, as is RF’s entire argumentation about these matters. And even if 

‘these nations round about ’ had not been listed so carefully, there would still 

have been plenty of evidence for the normal understanding, because the 

Hebrew word for nations is a much used standard term for the heathen or 

Gentile nations all around Israel: In Robert B.Girdlestone, Synonyms of the Old 

Testament, 2nd ed., p. 256 (Grand Rapids 1978) we read about the Hebrew term 

goy (‘nation’, in plural goyim, spelt goim in the book):


Throughout the historical books, the Psalms, and the prophets, the word 

goim primarily signifies those nations which lived in the immediate 

neighbourhood of the Jewish people; they were regarded as enemies, as 

ignorant of the truth, and sometimes as tyrants. 

This is corroborated by Brown-Driver-Briggs (page 156), according to which 

this term (goy) is used ‘usually of non-Hebr. peoples’. In a way, the seed of this 

development was sown very early -- as we know, when Noah’s offspring had 

reached 70 generations the Scriptural narrative began focusing on Shem’s line, 

and from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and his twelve sons onward the focus was 

narrowed down to just one nation, the chosen one, especially after the law 

covenant was given to it at Sinai. Of course, that did not mean that the other 

nations were never mentioned again, but from then on they were on the 

sidelines, as it were, as ‘the nations’, meaning the non-Jews, i.e. the heathen or 

Gentiles, as they are often called in older translations, such as KJV. The word 

itself occurs more than 830 times in the Hebrew Bible, and of these 86 or more 

than 10% are found in the book of Jeremiah; actually, in accord with the 

developments of his time, it is the Bible book with the most occurrences of this 

word. It is primarily used in the plural (goyim), often determined (haggoyim) and 

with the word kol (‘all’) in front; thus kol-haggoyim (‘all the nations’) occurs 16 

times in Jeremiah; there are also definite forms like the one in 25:11, that is, 

haggoyim ha’elleh (‘the nations the these’). This is a very emphatic construction, 

indicating (like all the determined ones, only stronger than most) that the 

nations referred to are well known to both the speaker and the listener. To 

anyone familiar with the contents of the prophecy of Jeremiah this comes as no 

surprise. – Gen. 10:1-32; 11:10-12:5; 17:1-27; 26:1-5; 35:22b-27; Ex. 19:1-20:21; 

24:1-18; 34:1-17; Deut. 7:1-7; 11:23, 24; 26:17-19; 28:1; Josh. 11:23; 2 Sam. 7:23; 

l Kgs 4:20-25. 

Actually, we have other witnesses to the understanding of Jeremiah defended 

here, namely the Watchtower writers who produced the book “All Scripture Is 

Inspired of God and Beneficial” (New York 1990), in which we read on page 127, 

paragraph 20: 

Jehovah’s controversy with the nations 

(25:1-38). This chapter is a summary of judgments that appear in greater detail 

in chapters 45-49. By three parallel prophecies, Jehovah now pronounces 

calamity for all the nations on earth. First, Nebuchadrezzar is identified as 

Jehovah’s servant to devastate Judah and the surrounding nations, “and these nations 

will have to serve the king of Babylon seventy years.” Then it will be Babylon’s turn, 

and she will become “desolate wastes to time indefinite.” – 25:1-14 (emphasis 

added). 

Thus the Watchtower people are in full agreement with the Bible on this point, 

although their pupil, RF, has chosen to view things differently. Actually, he 

again shows that he knows full well what is the natural translation of the latter 

clause in Jer. 25:11, namely the one shown as number 1 on top of page 84, ‘and 

these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy years.’ Moreover, his claim 

that the context focuses ‘upon the inhabitants of Judah rather than on some 

undefined nations’ is palpably false: as has been already demonstrated clearly,


the nations in question are very well defined! To be sure, the focus is here a 

broad one, including both Judah and Jerusalem first, and then all those 

surrounding nations, because they would all come under the heel of Babylon. 

And RF’s strange contention, that the designation ‘its inhabitants ... as 

mentioned in verse 8’ (should be 9) ought to be understood as the antecedent, 

not of the pronoun ‘they’, which does not occur in the Hebrew, but of the 

embedded (or implied) subject from the verb ‘abhedu, down in verse 11, is so 

farfetched from both a syntactical and a semantic viewpoint, that it is utterly 

impossible to take it seriously. Indeed, this can be said about his entire tortuous 

effort about this subject. 

What does ‘et mean in front of melekh? 

On page 83 RF once more turns to a tiny Hebrew particle for help in his 

quandary; this time it is the particle ‘et, which is seen prefixed to the word 

melekh in the latter clause of Jer. 25:11. As the analysis showed, the phrase ‘etmelekh 

babhel (‘king [of] Babylon’) constituted the direct object of that clause, 

signifying the one ‘these nations’ would have to serve for seventy years, and the 

particle ‘et functioned as the objective marker, as it generally does in Hebrew. 

However, RF does not want that to be so, and so he says, ‘While the particle ‘et 

is often used as object marker, it can be used as a preposition with the meaning 

“with” as well.’ Now, this needs a little modification, for in reality there are two 

etymologically different Hebrew particles spelled ‘et, not just one, as anyone 

can see for himself in the Hebrew dictionaries. Unfortunately they are always 

spelt in the same way when they do not take suffixes, and they are also both 

connected to the next word by the Hebrew hyphen, the so-called maqqeph, as 

the ‘et found in Jer. 25:11 is. This ‘et fits the description very well of the socalled 

accusative particle, which is ‘prefixed as a rule only to nouns that are 

definite’, that is, they need no article - proper nouns, titles, names of cities and 

nations, etc., are definite wihout it. 

At any rate, since there is no formal difference in this case, the context must 

decide which ‘et we are dealing with, and here the syntax is clear: as shown in 

the above analysis: ‘abhedu (‘they will serve’) is the verbal, haggoyim ha’elleh (’the 

nations the these’) is the overt subject, and so, quite naturally, ‘et-melekh babhel is 

the direct object. This is not only the ‘natural analysis’, it is simply the only 

analysis that makes sense! The renowned Hebraist Dr. Driver, who wrote the 

articles on all the various types of particles in the Hebrew and English Lexicon by 

Brown, Driver and Briggs, gave both particles excellent treatment in that 

dictionary, which see (pp. 84-87). Of course, he could not include all the 

occurrences, for ‘et occurs more than 10,000 times in the Hebrew Bible, and of 

them more than 830 are found in the book of Jeremiah. (A.M. Wilson,‘The 

particle ‘et in Hebrew’, Hebraica ,Vol. 6, 1890, No. 2, pp. 139-150; No. 3, pp. 

212-224) Happily, Dr. Driver also made a most excellent translation of The Book 

of The Prophet Jeremiah (London, 1906), and his rendering of Jeremiah 25:11 is 

quite clear and unambiguous as may be seen in the section prefaced by this 

subheading:


Judah, therefore, not less than the neighbouring countries, will be laid waste by the 

Chaldaeans, and be subject to them for seventy years. (See verses 11 and 12 below): 

11 And this whole land shall be a waste, and an appalment: and these nations 

shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years. 12 And it shall come to pass, 

when seventy years are accomplished, that I will punish the king of Babylon, 

and that nation, saith Yahweh, for their iniquity, and the land of the 

Chaldaeans; and I will make it desolate for ever. 

Let us just take a good look at another very authoritative translation, made by a 

grammarian and lexicographer of very high standing in continental Europe, 

similar to the one enjoyed by Dr. Driver in the English-speaking world, namely 

Professor Frants Buhl of Copenhagen and Leipzig, who edited Wilhelm 

Gesenius’ large Hebrew-German Handwörterbuch for a number of years. He also 

translated the Old Testament into Danish (Det gamle Testamente, Copenhagen 

1910) and here follows his rendering of Jeremiah 25:11, 12 in Danish: 

11 og hele dette land skal blive til en Ørk, og disse Folkeslag skal trælle for 

Babels Konge i halvfjerdsinstyve Aar. 12 Men naar der er forløbet 

halvfjerdsinstyve Aar, straffer jeg Babels Konge og dette Folk, og gør det til 

evige Ørkener. (Cf. the English rendering below): 

11 and all this land shall become a desert, and these nations must slave for 

the king of Babylon for seventy years. 12 But when seventy years have run 

their course, I will punish the king of Babel and this people, and make it 

into everlasting deserts. 

Now, these two eminent Hebraists are most certainly not the only ones who 

have rendered Jeremiah’s words in this way; facts are, I haven’t been able to 

find a single translation or commentary opting for the solution suggested by 

RF, i.e., to regard the ‘et prefixed to melekh (babhel ) in verse 11 as the 

preposition meaning ‘with’, and I take it for granted that RF has failed in this 

regard too, or else he would no doubt have told us about it. Consequently, we 

shall disregard RF’s very unorthodox idea as a mere figment of his imagination 

and stick to the natural and straightforward sense of the Hebrew text of 

Jeremiah, exactly as the real experts in Biblical Hebrew have rendered it. 

What about the LXX and the Old Ethiopic? 

As for the LXX, preferred by RF, we agree with the view expressed in the 

Watchtower publication Insight on the Scriptures, vol. II, page 32 (in the article 

about the Book of Jeremiah): 

The majority of scholars agree that the Greek translation of this 

book is defective, but that does not lessen the reliability of the 

Hebrew text. 

As it is, the LXX lacks about one seventh of the Hebrew text and the 

translators have taken many liberties with it, omitting words and phrases here 

and there, adding others not found in the Hebrew, and it is generally unreliable. 

After all, it is a second-hand text, a translation into an Indo-European language, 

made by people who may not have been too well acquainted with Classical


Hebrew, and who admittedly made many mistakes. Regarding the Old Ethiopic, 

which RF also favours, it is an even weaker witness; no one knows when it was 

made but apparently it took centuries to complete, and the oldest manuscripts 

are rather late, no earlier than the 13th century CE. Moreover, it is to a great 

degree influenced by the LXX, and it cannot really be regarded as an 

independent witness. After all, Jeremiah was an inspired prophet and his 

original prophecies taken down in Hebrew and preserved in that language to 

this very day are the best evidence we have about these matters. The Hebrew 

text is also supported by the ancient Semitic translations, the Aramaic Targum 

Jonathan and the Syriac Peshitta, which are much closer to the original Hebrew 

than the Greek LXX. 

Jeremiah 29:10 

However, there is one more scripture mentioning the seventy years, the short 

verse here mentioned, and to this RF now turns (page 85), apparently hoping 

that he can finally prove his point. However, it is as though the long and hard 

uphill battle has taken his breath away, for he offers neither transliteration nor 

translation; instead he again focuses on a tiny particle, the preposition le 

prefixed to the word babhel, which he feels has been wrongly rendered by the 

standard translations. Let us just take a look at the verse in question, 

transliterating and translating it for the benefit of the reader: 

‘amar YHWH ki lephi mel’ot lebabhel shibhim shanah 

for-this says Jehovah when 

10 kikhoh 

by-mymouth 

to-becompleted 

for- 

Babel 

seventy year(s) 

‘ephqo 

d 

‘etkhe 

m 

vehaqimo 

ti 

you and-I-will 

fulfill 

hattob lechasi ‘etkhe 

h r m 

‘alhammaqo 

m 

I-willvisit 

‘aleikhe ‘etdebhar 

m 

i 

to-you myword 

the- 

good- 

(one) 

you 

to-the 

place 

hazze 

h 

toreturn 

thisone 

Among the many modern translations the NIV gives a good and adequate 

rendering, but the NWT fails in one point and that is the one that RF wants, 

for it renders lebabhel ‘at Babylon’, as against NIV’s ‘for Babylon’. Let’s recall 

that Dr. Driver, who wrote all the articles on the prepositions in Brown-Driver- 

Briggs, also translated the Book of Jeremiah into reasonably modern English (in 

1906); here is his version of Jeremiah 29:10 (emphasis added): 

10 For thus saith Yahweh, As soon as seventy years be accomplished for 

Babylon, I will visit you, and perform my good word toward you, in bringing 

you back unto this place. 

Moreover, he placed an interesting subtitle over this section in the 29th chapter, 

showing how he understood this important scripture; it goes like this:


For no restoration will take place till the seventy years of Babylonian domination are ended, 

when those now in exile with Jehoiachin will turn to Yahweh, and he will bring them back 

(cf. xxiv, 5-7). 

Since we are investigating the semantic contents of the preposition le, we may 

as well note that Professor Buhl used the very same word in Danish, ‘for’, and 

that the noted German grammarian and translator Emil Kautzsch (who edited 

Gesenius’ Hebrew grammar later translated into English by A. Cowley) used 

the German form of the same preposition, namely ‘für’, in front of the word 

‘Babel’. Actually, already Luther had used the preposition ‘für’ here, as early as 

in 1534. The same usage (‘for Babel’) is found in the translation by Dr. Chr. H. 

Kalkar (Copenhagen 1847), who as a converted Jew was an expert in Biblical 

Hebrew. As it is, all the most serious and reasonably literal translations have 

‘for’ here, or words to that effect; NEB has a slightly different wording: ‘When 

a full seventy years have passed over Babylon,...’ and AAT has: ‘As soon as 

Babylon has finished seventy years,...’, while Moffatt has: ‘As soon as Babylon’s 

seventy years are over,...’. The Jewish translation Tanakh agrees with Moffatt, 

while the older ones by Leeser and JPS use ‘for’. As is well known, the KJV has 

‘at Babylon’, which is not so strange when one bethinks that it most likely was 

influenced by the Vulgate’s ‘in Babylone’; after all, most of the early English 

translations until and including the KJV were influenced by that old Latin 

version – also, the knowledge of Biblical Hebrew was rather imperfect then, but 

fortunately it has improved enormously since 1611. Curiously, the so-called 

‘New King James Version’ (1982) has kept the ‘at’ here; however, the reason 

may well be that the editors did not want a total revision (cf. the Preface), but 

rather a mere modernization, such as the replacing of obsolete words like ‘thou, 

thee, thy’ and ‘thine’ with the modern pronouns ‘you, your’ and ‘yours’. 

However, when the Revised Version came out in 1885 the knowledge of 

Hebrew was much greater – there were no less than ten professors of Hebrew 

in the so-called ‘Old Testament Company’ who revised the Hebrew part of the 

Bible (including Jeremiah), and so things were changed. One of the real experts 

among them was Dr. Driver, who has been mentioned already, and it would 

have been unthinkable for him to render such a preposition wrongly. At that 

time he was already engaged in the work of compiling the great Hebrew 

lexicon, in which he gave an expert account of the preposition le on pages 510- 

518, covering a total of 16 columns. Here he classified the meanings of le under 

seven main headings and a lot of subheadings and even lesser groups, totaling 

69 semantic variants, some even overlapping. The very smallest main heading, 

with no subgroups at all, is No. 2 (page 511), ‘Expressing locality, at, near’, 

which does not, however, contain anything supporting RF’s views. 

Dr. Driver gives as the general sense of this preposition ‘to, for, in regard to, ... 

denoting direction (not properly motion, as (‘el) towards, or reference to; and hence 

used in many varied applications, in some of which the idea of direction 

predominates, in others that of reference to ... very often, with various classes of 

verbs, to, towards, for.’ Similar explanations are given in Gesenius-Buhl and 

Köhler-Baumgartner. Interestingly, it was not only in the Revised Version but 

also in its transatlantic counterpart, the American Standard Version of 1901, 

KJV’s ‘at Babylon’ had been corrected to ‘for Babylon’, and that wording has


been kept in the versions later made in that tradition, such as the RSV of 1952 

and the NASB of 1977. By the way, on page 86 RF says that the LXX ‘has the 

dative form babulôni, the most natural meaning being “at Babylon”.’ Now, the 

Greek form is correct, but the sense is not, for in Greek the dative used here is 

the dativus commodi et incommodi. (Also called ‘the dative of advantage and 

disadvantage’, cf. C.F.D.Moule, An Idiom-Book of New Testament Greek, 2nd ed., 

Cambridge U.P., 1971, p. 46) See W.W. Goodwin, A Greek Grammar, London 

et al, 1970, pp. 247ff., § 1165, which says: ‘This dative is generally introduced in 

English by ‘for’.” This is of great importance, as may be seen from the 

statement by F.C. Conybeare and St. G. Stock in A Grammar of Septuagint Greek 

(Grand Rapids 1980) § 38, in which they discuss the peculiar syntax of the 

LXX: 

The Construction of the LXX not Greek. ... the LXX is on the whole a literal 

translation, it is to say, it is only half a translation – the vocabulary has been 

changed, but seldom the construction. We have therefore to deal with a 

work of which the vocabulary is Greek and the syntax Hebrew. 

Apparently, then, the translators of the LXX understood the phrase lebabhel 

correctly and so rendered it in the best possible way into a Greek form having 

exactly the same sense as the original Hebrew, i.e. ‘for Babylon.’ Why Jerome 

didn’t imitate this fine effort when making the Vulgate is not known, but in 

connection with his ‘in Babylone’ and KJV’s ‘at Babylon’ we ought to realize 

that such a rendering does not in any way ‘prove’ RF’s contentions about the 

length of the exile and Jerusalem’s devastation: We know from Jeremiah 25:11 

that ‘these nations [i.e., ‘these nations all around’, the ones defined so clearly in 

Jeremiah 25:17-26] shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years’, and these 

seventy years would naturally pass for all and sundry, whether ‘in’ or ‘at’ 

Babylon or elsewhere. Mark you, neither this scripture nor anyone else says ‘for 

Judah’ or ‘for ‘Israel’ or for ‘the exiles’! So, even though RF and his fellow 

believers stubbornly stick to their erroneous interpretation of the inspired 

words of Jehovah spoken by Jeremiah, they have no solid evidence for their 

ideas! 

In the case of the sense of le in Jeremiah 29:10 we have the clear evidence 

outlined in a work which RF does not mention, namely Professor Ernst Jenni’s 

Die hebräischen Präpositionen. Band 3: Die Präposition Lamed (Stuttgart et al, 2000). 

In this monumental work Dr. Jenni lists and categorizes each and every 

occurrence of le in the entire Hebrew Bible, all 20,725 of them! Here we find le 

as used in Jeremiah 29:10 (in lebabhel) on page 109, ‘Rubrik’ 4363, where it is 

listed with a few other scriptures in which some forms of the verb ml’ [mal’e], 

‘voll werden (Tage/Jahr[e])’, ‘(to become full, complete, (days/year[s])’ occur; 

it is listed as a subgroup under 436, ‘Dauer’ (‘duration’). Thus the verbal lemall’ot 

in 2 Chronicles 36:21 means, as shown earlier, ‘to complete fully’ and the verbal 

melo’t ‘to be completed’ (qal infinitive construct) in Jeremiah 29:10, while the 

direct object lebabhel means ‘for Babylon’: this corresponds to Dr. Driver’s 

definition 5. g. (b), where le is said to be ‘corresponding to the Latin dativus 

commodi’, with the general meaning ‘for’, and that brings us back to the LXXrendering 

mentioned above with the ‘dativus commodi’ Babulôni, giving exactly 

the same meaning. In his ‘argumentation’ RF referred to some other scriptures


in which le had been rendered with a local meaning, as ‘at’, ‘in’ or ‘to’, and of 

course Jenni has these verses in his classification, e.g. defining le in Jeremiah 

51:2 as a ‘personal dative of Babel, personified as world power’, and Jeremiah 

3:17 as a ‘local directional’. Both of these are used correctly in their contexts, 

agreeing with the general sense of le, ‘to, towards, for’, and the full details about 

them and their various uses (e.g. the ‘local’ or ‘directional’) can be found in Dr. 

Jenni’s very precise classification. 

As for the last scripture mentioned by RF in this connection, Jeremiah 40:11, a 

check on some translations of this verse shows that not everything is as simple 

as RF appears to think; if, for instance, he had checked the LXX, he would 

have found a genitive construction in Jer. 47:11 (corresponding to MT’s 40:11), 

which Sir Launcelot Lee Brenton rendered ‘the king of Babylon had granted a 

remnant to Judah’ in the Bagster Septuagint. (Reprint of 1976). The very same 

construction is found in Rotherham’s The Emphasized Bible, while the NASB 

uses ‘left a remnant for Judah’; several versions have ‘a remnant of Judah’ (e.g. 

NKJV; RV; ASV) and Leeser’s Jewish translation has ‘left a remnant unto 

Judah’. Let us also take a look at a very scholarly Norwegian rendering by 

Mowinckel and Messell in DET GAMLE TESTAMENTE De senere Profeter 

(Oslo 1944), page 417: ‘Babelkongen hadde unt Judafolket en rest’, (‘the king of 

Babylon had granted the people of Judah a remnant’) and then, for the sake of 

good order, we’ll close this little check-up by quoting NW: ‘the king of 

Babylon had given a remnant to Judah.’ (Emphasis added where pertinent) 

Even though quite a few versions have ‘in’ as suggested by RF, it appears to be 

impossible to get a complete consensus on the way to render le in this verse! 

In his discussion of the possibility of using le in a local sense as ‘at’ (page 86, § 

2) RF points out that ‘The Dictionary of Classical Hebrew lists about 30 examples of 

this meaning’. Now, this is not so strange and it is actually a very small 

percentage when we recall that this preposition occurs more than 20,000 times 

in the Hebrew Bible. To be honest, that learned dictionary does not seem to 

offer the most comprehensive or the most detailed treatment of le, for it has 

only a total of 373 examples in its entry on that preposition (pages 479-485), 

while Brown-Driver-Briggs has more than 1500! What is more, whenever BDB 

has treated a category of le as found in one of the books of the Bible, it usually 

adds that the listed examples are followed by many more in that book or 

chapter. Moreover, it brims with grammatical and general linguistic 

information, adding many useful references to Aramaic, Syriac and other 

Semitic tongues for the sake of comparison. 

Regarding the examples of le being used in the sense of ‘at’, RF is somewhat 

less than accurate, for in section 4. in the dictionary he uses, which treats ‘of 

place, at, by, on, along, over’, there are only 11 examples of ‘at’, not 30! The 

section lists 31 verses with a total of 35 examples of ‘local’ le, some of which are 

even rendered ‘for’, ‘to’, or by other words, and there is no added grammatical 

explanation of any kind whatsoever. Of course, Gesenius-Buhl and Köhler- 

Baumgartner also have plenty of information on this preposition and its usage, 

so as not to speak of Professor Jenni’s magnificent volume quoted above. 

One more point about lebabhel in Jeremiah 29:10: On page 85, the last six lines, 

RF relates that of 70 translations in his library only six had the ‘local’ meaning,


that is, ‘at’ in English, which means that the other sixty-four had something 

else, presumably ‘for’ or a similar wording. Why this didn’t give him pause is 

difficult to understand -- how can he prefer six renderings to sixty-four? 

Unfortunately, he identifies only the six he prefers, and not a single one of the 

majority, the sixty-four with which he disagrees, a fact which only adds to the 

evidence for his marked prejudice. Of course, NWT is really not a good 

witness, for the false dogmas of the Watchtower translators undoubtedly 

caused them to use this rendering. As for the KJV, we have already seen why 

that old and really outdated version is to be disregarded in this context, and the 

same may be said about the other English ones as well, e.g. Harkavy’s Hebrew- 

English edition from 1939, in which the English translation is actually taken 

directly from the KJV! Lamsa’s slightly newer version (from 1957) is no better, 

as it is heavily influenced by the KJV, and one needs only a short survey of 

Helen Spurrell’s A Translation of the Old Testament from the Original Hebrew 

(London 1885) to see that her rendering is clearly patterned on the old KJV, 

even though it is certainly not a mere copy - to the contrary, she has many 

renderings which are clear improvements on KJV, such as using JEHOVAH 

instad of ‘the LORD’. Interestingly, in her Preface she made a special claim 

about the text from which she made her translation: 

It seems scarcely necessary to mention that the translation is made from the 

unpointed Hebrew; that being the Original Hebrew. 

Actually, it would have been strange for her not to have copied the pattern of 

the old KJV, which had held the field as the ‘Authorized Version’ for centuries; 

indeed, to have abandoned it entirely might well have impaired the acceptance 

of Miss Spurrell’s version, which she claimed had ‘almost entirely occupied her 

time for many years past.’ It is an interesting coincidence that her translation 

was published in London in 1885, in the very same year in which the Old 

Testament part of The Revised Version was issued, a fact, however, which 

precludes her having had access to this new edition, in which the ‘at’ in 

Jeremiah 29:10 had been replaced by ‘for’. 

Now, of course the Swedish Church Bible of 1917 does not have the English 

‘at’ or some particle directly representing it, as e.g. ‘på, vid, hos’, but it has ‘i’ 

(‘in’) which doesn’t prove a thing because, as stated above, the ‘seventy years’ 

which had been decided ‘for’ Babylon’s dominion, would also pass ‘in’ or ‘at’ 

Babylon, as well as in all the lands mentioned, in Judah as well as among the 

Gentiles. Also, this old Swedish version has now been replaced by no less than 

two new ones (in 1998 and 2000) which both correctly read ‘for Babylon’ in 

Jeremiah 29:10. Actually, since all the faulty supports of RF have now fallen by 

the wayside, he ought to accept defeat and start using the correct renderings of 

the other sixty-four! And since he has begun to look at the Scandinavian Bibles, 

he might check the NW-Bible in Danish which has had ‘for Babylon’ in 

Jeremiah 29:10 ever since the first edition was printed in 1985, and it is 

unchanged in the large study edition of 1993! 

The words of Zechariah 

This section will not be treated here, since the verses used by RF have no 

relation to the subject under discussion, cf. C.O. Jonsson, The Gentile Times 

Reconsidered, 4th ed., Atlanta 2004, pp. 225-229.

A theological attempt ... 


Thus far it has been a very disappointing experience to go through RF’s twisted 

and contorted attempts to ‘prove’ his outlandish views about the length of the 

devastation of Jerusalem and Judah and the exile of the Judeans, but this 

section testifies to a stubbornness in the matter of doctrine on RF’s part which 

is hard to comprehend. Here he deals with a two-part article by an Adventist 

scholar named Ross E. Winkle who has gone through all the relevant material 

about this topic and written a well-researched and well-formulated piece which 

by dint of its careful scholarship and its sober style outshines RF’s ‘fuzzy’ and 

‘muddled’ product by far. 

He quite correctly sees Winkle’s conclusion as the opposite of his own: ‘There 

is no passage in the Bible which definitely says that Jerusalem and Judah should 

be desolate for 70 years while the people were exiles in Babylon!’ What RF does 

not concede, however, in the face of the overwhelming Biblical and linguistic 

evidence for Winkle’s conclusion, is that it is correct! In fact, Winkle proves his 

point in a very careful and methodical way, far removed from RF’s prolix and 

clumsy attempts to pervert the clear and incontrovertible truth of God’s Word. 

Actually, despite his lengthy and confused efforts, RF does not prove one single 

point of his Watchtower-inspired theory, for the very simple reason that it is 

not true! 

Some of his arguments in this part are nothing less than ludicrous: he does not 

like that ‘Winkle seems to assume that what the Bible says is true’, (indeed, what 

is wrong with that? Doesn’t the Watchtower people reason in the same way as 

Winkle?) and neither does he like Winkle’s acceptance of ‘the traditional 

chronology’ - but here Winkle stands on firm ground: the Bible is God’s own 

inspired word, truthful and inerrant, and what RF calls ‘traditional chronology’ 

is certainly not based on ‘circular arguments’ but on many years of diligent 

research by serious and competent scholars! Of course, mistakes have been 

made over the years, especially in the infancy of this science, but in time they 

have ben corrected whenever new evidence came to light, and today the ancient 

history and chronology of the Middle East for the first millennium B.C.E. is 

well-established and trustworthy in practically all aspects, notwithstanding RF’s 

contrary claims and his unproven pet theories. 

RF truly feels unhappy about Winkle’s beginning from Jeremiah’s testimony 

and his going on from there to Daniel and the Chronicler, while he himself 

starts with Daniel and the Chronicler and then goes back to Jeremiah; however, 

in a situation like this the ideal method is actually to begin from the beginning, 

which naturally means to take Jeremiah’s prophecies first and then, having 

familiarized oneself with their message, to move on chronologically to the later 

reactions to these early prophecies and their fulfilment, going first to Daniel 

and then to the somewhat later Chronicler. In this way the true picture of the 

events of those times emerges clearly, and that is evidently what Winkle tries to 

do even though he takes the Chronicler before Daniel, probably because he 

wants to handle the matter of the ‘sabbath rest’ for the land properly, without 

getting it mixed up with the message of Jeremiah’s prophecies, and this he does 

very well indeed.


RF also dislikes Winkle’s reference to the literary style of some of Jeremiah’s 

verses, and in this connection he refers to pages 210, 211 in Winkle’s article; 

this is very good, for thus he reveals whence he has his ideas about 

‘parallelisms’ (cf. RF, pp. 79, 80). Let us just take a look at this, before we move 

on: RF claimed that 2 Chronicles 36:21 formed in four lines a genuine Hebrew 

parallelism, which I disclaimed, showing that this stylistic feature does not 

occur in Hebrew prose such as the text in question. Nevertheless, Winkle was 

first to suggest something like that, even though he did not make quite the 

same claim that RF did, no doubt because he knew better. Winkle wrote the 

following about 2 Chronicles 36:20b-21 (pp. 209-211): 

In this passage there are two sets of parallel clauses, either beginning 

with ‘ad or lemallot. Displaying the text according to a quasi-poetic style 

(in order to highlight the parallels) results in the following (my 

translation): 

Line 

1 And they were servants to him and his sons 

2 until (‘ad) the reign of the kingdom of Persia 

3 in order to fulfill (lemallot) the word 

4 of the LORD in the mouth of Jeremiah 

5 until (‘ad) the land had enjoyed its sabbaths 

6 (all the days of its desolation 

7 it kept sabbath) 

8 in order to fulfill (lemallot) seventy years 

Line 2 completes the thought of line 1, while lines 3-4 further clarify 

lines 1 and 2. Line 5, which starts with the same word as line 2, must be 

parallel to it. 

After this Winkle quotes three examples of this kind of ‘parallel structure’ 

(Exodus 16:35; Jeremiah 1:3; 2 Chronicles 36:16), and he is right as far as the 

similarity of structure is concerned. However, none of these examples fulfill the 

criteria for true poetic parallelism such as found in the poetic writings in the 

Hebrew Bible. Instead of this we may apply to them the words of Professor E. 

König of Bonn University as found in Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible (Vol. V, p. 

116) where he issued a warning against regarding everything rhythmic in 

Hebrew prose as though it were parallelisms: 

It must be remembered that the higher form of prose, as employed 

especially by good speakers, was not without a certain kind of rhythm. 

Indeed, this higher form of prose by such eminent speakers as the great 

prophets, e.g. Jeremiah, whose book is written for a large part (more than half) 

in poetic form (cf. NIV), and who also penned the all-poetic book of


Lamentations, often used a structure resembling parallelism, but we must 

remember that simple syntactical parallelistic structures do not on that count 

alone qualify as true parallelisms; for that the sense, the meaning must be 

parallelistic, and the form follow the rules of this special style of Semitic poetry 

(for this, see R.K. Harrison, Introduction to the Old Testament, London 1970, Part 

Twelve, I. Hebrew Poetry; pages 965-975, and similar works). 

Apparently, Ross E. Winkle was well aware of this when he wrote the above, 

for he did not claim that he was dealing with genuine poetic parallelisms, but 

designated the form of his ‘parallel clauses’ a ‘quasi-poetic style’, and in this he 

was correct because that was all that they were. It seems as though RF 

overlooked this and so made another one of his typical mistakes; this he also 

does when he intimates that Winkle’s argument ‘puts the text upside down’, 

because he himself is the one who does that, misinterpreting the clear messages 

of Jeremiah, Daniel and the Chronicler. Moreover, it seems that he also 

borrowed something else from Winkle who says in the last few lines on page 

211, that ‘modern translations of vs. 2 [Dan. 9:2] are rather ambiguous as far as 

the timing of the seventy years is concerned.’ This is, of course, correct, as 

Winkle’s examples (and several others) prove, but it is one thing to point out 

that some of the ‘modern’ translations are ‘ambiguous’, disturbing the sense of 

the text by their poor rendering, and then to claim that the inspired words of 

Jehovah uttered by the prophet Jeremiah to God’s chosen people are 

ambiguous and need interpretation by somebody living many years later, who 

had seen their fulfilment. RF adds to his errors when he says that ‘Winkle takes 

for granted that both the Bible and the traditional New Babylonian chronology 

are true’, not on the basis of linguistic knowledge, but ‘by appealing ... to more 

elusive reasons’, because this is just the other way around - the only elusive 

reasons presented in this connection are ‘Made by RF’! 

Said in all fairness, Ross E. Winkle’s article is one of the best and most sober 

disquisitions on this subject I’ve yet seen, and it is certainly worth having and 

reading, which can hardly be said about RF’s bit. Indeed, there is more true 

scholarship in Winkle’s two short articles than in RF’s entire fourth chapter 

dealt with here, and probably even though all the chapters in his book were 

included. 

The two poles ... 

In this last section of RF’s ‘exposition’ he reverts to his chronological 

speculations, repeating once again his false claims about the Bible stating that 

the exile lasted seventy years, but since these utterly untrue speculations have 

been thoroughly disproved in the foregoing, there seems to be no need to go 

into this discussion again. 

Summary and Conclusion 

Having gone through RF’s discussion of the scriptures mentioning the seventy 

years it is time to assess his effort: First, his treatment of the Hebrew text, 

including his transliterations, grammatical ‘analyses’ and translations are too 

imprecise and far below par for someone introducing himself as a lecturer of 

Semitic languages in a reputable university. Actually, his understanding of


Classical Hebrew and his command of its grammar, usage and style appear to 

be defective. Moreover, his entire argumentation consists of the feeblest 

possible postulates, to wit: 

He begins by presenting some very categorical statements, entirely without 

evidence, after which he surmises that the parts of the inspired Bible text with 

which he disagrees are ‘ambiguous’, which they are not; then he tries to make 

the Hebrew text say something which simply is not in it, and when that appears 

impossible he opts for the LXX and the Old Ethiopic versions, both of which 

are defective or faulty in the verses referred to. In his dealings with the main 

scriptures under discussion, from Jeremiah, Daniel and the Chronicler, he bases 

much of his argument on three tiny particles, trying to make them say what no 

Hebrew dictionary, grammar or translator accept, all apparently in the hope that 

his gullible readers will believe him. The only grammar book he refers to is a 

rather short syntax, actually little more than a collection of samples whose 

author does not even stay within the referential framework of Hebrew 

grammatical nomenclature, but creates his own terms, which, of course, is not 

very helpful to the students. And the only Hebrew dictionary to which he refers 

casually is a new and relatively little known work, which, when examined, does 

not even support his claims! And in his description of a truly scholarly 

treatment of the subject he has chosen for himself he appears to be entirely out 

of his depth - it is as though he cannot see the wood for the trees! 

In a sense, it is somewhat difficult to find out exactly what RF believes in, 

because for years he has been known as a member of the congregation of 

Jehovah’s Witnesses, defending their positions on the matters discussed in his 

book. However, apparently he does not share their absolute faith in the Bible as 

God’s inspired and truthful word, such as when he claims that parts of God’s 

Word are ‘ambiguous’, which they are not according to the usual Watchtower 

doctrine; their views of the entire Bible may be summed up in Paul’s statement, 

‘All Scripture Is Inspired of God and beneficial’ (2 Tim. 3:16, 17), cf the 

Watchtower publication bearing that title. Furthermore, he criticizes the 

Adventist scholar Ross Winkle for ‘assuming that what the Bible says is true’, 

which for him apparently is a mere starting point for his own private 

ruminations. As for the chronology of the period in question, he also feels 

entitled to assess these matters for himself, without any regard for the weighty 

results of the diligent research by numerous competent scholars worldwide. In 

this method, however, he seems to emulate his Watchtower mentors, who also 

handles such matters in their own way, as was revealed by Raymond Franz, the 

former member of the Governing Body of Jehovah’s Witnesses who wrote the 

long chapter on chronology in the book Aid to Bible Understanding (New York 

1969, 1971); in his own book Crisis of Conscience (Atlanta, 4 th edition 2002), he 

explained that in trying to prove historically the date set for Jerusalem’s 

destruction by the witnesses (607 BCE) he discovered that there was no 

evidence for this whatsoever. Now, what did this seasoned Watchtower writer 

do under such circumstances? This he explains in detail (page 26): 

Everything pointed to a period twenty years shorter than our published 

chronology claimed. Though I found this disquieting, I wanted to believe 

that our chronology was right in spite of all the contrary evidence. Thus,


in preparing the material for the Aid-book, much of the time and space 

was spent in trying to weaken the credibility of the archaeological and 

historical evidence that would make erroneous our 607 B.C.E. date and 

give a different starting point for our calculations and therefore an 

ending date different from 1914. ... like an attorney faced with evidence 

he cannot overcome, my efforts was to discredit or weaken confidence 

in witnesses from ancient times ... [so as] to uphold a date for which 

there was no historical support. 

This confession of Mr Franz is very revealing, as it shows to what length 

Jehovah’s Witnesses will go when it comes to defending their ancient dogmas, 

and it is evident that Rolf Furuli has learned from this method: he is willing to 

discredit God’s Word and twist it for the sake of the doctrines of the sect to 

which he belongs; a very deplorable attitude, which, however, is in near perfect 

tune with that of the leaders of the organization. Indeed, the entire presentation 

is one long and stubborn manipulation of the facts in a most non-scientific way, 

as can be seen in his very selective use of ‘evidence’, omitting, avoiding or 

denigrating anything and everything which is not in accord with his prejudiced 

views. And when he has to face the sound interpretations by reputable scholars, 

he does his very best to circumvent them in a mode reminiscent of the style 

employed for long by his mentors, the leaders of the sect to which he belongs. 

This is not really a scholarly work which may be used to edify truth-seeking 

people, but a narrow-minded, sectarian work of little consequence.

A critical review of Rolf Furuli’s 2 nd volume on chronology: 

Assyrian, Babylonian and Egyptian Chronology. Volume II 

of Assyrian, Babylonian, Egyptian, and Persian 

Chronology Compared with the Chronology of the Bible 

(Oslo: Awatu Publishers, 2007). 

Part I: The astronomical “diary” VAT 4956 

Rolf Furuli’s new book on chronology, Assyrian, Babylonian and Egyptian Chronology (Oslo: 

Awatu Publishers, 2007), covers 368 pages. Chapter 6 (pages 94-123) and Appendix C (266- 

325), which together cover 90 pages or about 25 percent of the book, are devoted to an 

attempt to overcome the evidence provided by the astronomical cuneiform tablet VAT 

4956, dated to the 37 th year of Nebuchadnezzar II. 

VAT 4956 is a so-called astronomical “diary” that records the positions of the moon and 

the five planets visible to the naked eye observed during the 37 th year of Nebuchadnezzar. 

About 30 of these records are so well preserved that they can be checked by modern 

computations. These computations have confirmed that the 37 th year of Nebuchadnezzar 

corresponds to year 568/567 BCE (spring-to-spring). 

HAS VAT 4956 BEEN “TAMPERED WITH” IN MODERN TIMES? 

Furuli dedicates a substantial part of his discussion to arguing that the cuneiform signs on 

the tablet have been “deliberately tampered with” in modern times. In particular he claims 

that the signs for “year 37” at the beginning of the text in line 1 on the obverse of the tablet 

and the signs for “year 38” and “year 37” in the concluding lines at the lower edge on the 

reverse seem to have been “incised” by someone in modern times. He also claims that the 

signs for the name “Nebuchadnezzar” in line 1 on the obverse have been manipulated. 

After a lengthy analysis Furuli presents the following hypothesis on pages 285, 286: 

484

Furuli’s Second Book 485 

“A consideration of the data above together with the unusual publication 

history of the tablet leads to the following hypothesis: VAT 4956 is an 

authentic cuneiform tablet that was copied from older tablets in one of the 

last centuries B.C.E. It came to the Vorderasiatische Museum in Berlin about 

1905 as one single entity. Someone discovered that the tablet was extremely 

important because it was an astronomical tablet with the hitherto oldest 

astronomical observations. These observations seemed to fit year 37 of 

Nebuchadnezzar II according to the chronology of Ptolemy, but a clear 

connection with Nebuchadnezzar II was lacking. In order to make this 

connection perfectly clear, the one working with the tablet used a modern 

grinding machine on the edge of the tablet, thus incising the signs for ‘year 

37’ and ‘year 38.’ The first line with the name of the king was also 

manipulated. Because of the vibration, the tablet broke into three pieces, 

which were then glued together. It was discovered that the fit of the signs on 

both sides of the break on the reverse side was not perfect, and a grinding 

machine was used to try to remedy this. If this hypothesis is correct, a direct 

link to years 37 and 38 of Nebuchadnezzar II was not originally found on 

the tablet, but the lunar observations are genuine, while the planetary 

positions are probably backward calculations.” 

On pages 295-324 Furuli discusses the astronomical contents reported on the tablet. He finds 

that the planetary positions on the whole fit the year 568/567 BCE, but claims that the 13 

lunar positions better fit the year 588/587 BCE. At the end of the Appendix on pages 324, 

325, therefore, he draws the following conclusions: 

“The following principal conclusions can be drawn on the basis of the 

discussion of VAT 4956: The Diary is most likely a genuine tablet made in 

Seleucid times, but in modern times someone has tampered with some of 

the cuneiform signs. Because of the excellent fit of all 13 lunar positions in 

588/87, there are good reasons to believe that the lunar positions represent 

observations from that year, and that the original tablet that was copied in 

Seleucid times was made in 588/87. Because so many of the planetary 

positions are approximately correct, but not completely correct, there are 

good reasons to believe that they represent backward calculations by an 

astrologer who believed that 568/67 was year 37 of Nebuchadnezzar II. 

Thus, the lunar positions seem to be original observations from 588/87, and 

the planetary positions are backward calculations for the positions of the 

planets in 568/67.” 

What about the claim that someone in modern times has “tampered” with the signs on the 

tablet and, by using “a modern grinding machine on the edge of the tablet,” has incised the 

signs for ‘year 37’ and ‘year 38’ on the tablet? Furuli proposes this idea as a “hypothesis,” as 

he knows very well that he has not been able to present any evidence in support of the idea. 

According to Furuli’s hypothesis, the supposed modern forger did not only incise the signs 

for “year 37” and “year 38” at the edge of the tablet. He also incised the signs for “year 37” 

and “manipulated” the signs for the name of the king, Nebuchadnezzar, in the beginning of 

line 1 on the obverse. The first question is how he could have done this, as there would 

have been no space at all at the beginning of the line for adding anything? 

If there was another date and a different royal name on the original tablet, the modern 

forger had first to remove these signs (with the supposed grinding machine?) before the 

signs of the new date and the signs of the changes of the royal name could be incised on the 

tablet. But such a replacement of the first signs of line 1 could never have been done 

without leaving clear traces (e.g., depressions in the tablet) at the beginning of the line. No 

such traces exist. The signs look quite genuine. As one specialist on cuneiform points out:


“Anyone acquainted with cuneiform can see that ‘year 37’ and ‘year 38’ are 

written by an experienced scribe. No modern person could have achieved to 

scratch (into dried clay!!) true-looking signs.” (Communication Hermann 

Hunger–C. O. Jonsson, Jan. 8, 2008) 

Another problem with Furuli’s hypothesis is the identity of the supposed modern forger of 

the dates and the royal name on the tablet. The first translation of the tablet was that of Paul 

V. Neugebauer and Ernst Weidner, whose translation together with an astronomical 

examination and a discussion of it was published back in 1915. (“Ein astronomischer 

Beobachtungstext aus dem 37. Jahre Nebukadnezars II. (– 567/66),” Berichte über die 

Verhandlungen der königlich sächlichen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Leipzig. Philologischhistorische 

Klasse. 67. Band. Leipzig: B. G. Teubner, 1915) 

As the article by Neugebauer and Weidner clearly shows, the date and the royal name (“year 

37 of Nebuchadnezzar”) were already on the tablet in 1915 when they were examining it. 

Are we to believe that these two scholars were forgers, who co-operated in removing some 

of the original signs on the tablet and replacing them with signs of their own preference? 

Even Furuli admits that he “cannot imagine that any scientist working with the tablet at the 

Vorderasiatische Museum has committed fraud.” (Furuli, p. 285) He has no idea about who 

the supposed forger may have been, or how he/she managed to change the signs on line 1 

without leaving any traces of it on the tablet. 

Finally, Furuli’s hypothesis is self-contradictory. If it were true that the planetary positions 

“represent backward calculations by an astrologer who believed that 568/67 was year 37 of 

Nebuchadnezzar II,” and if it were true that “the original tablet that was copied in Seleucid 

times was made in 588/87,” which Furuli argues was the 37 th year of Nebuchadnezzar, then 

the astrologer/copyist must have dated the tablet to the 37 th year of Nebuchadnezzar from 

the very beginning! No modern manipulation of the date would then have been necessary. 

Furuli’s hypothesis is simply untenable. The only reason for his suggesting it is the desperate 

need to get rid of a tablet that inexorably demolishes his “Oslo [= Watchtower] chronology” 

and firmly establishes the absolute chronology for the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II (604-562 

BCE). 

As discussed in chapter 4 of my book The Gentile Times Reconsidered (Atlanta: Commentary 

Press, 2004), there are at least nine other astronomical tablets that perform the same service. 

Furuli’s futile attempts to undermine the enormous burden of evidence provided by these 

other astronomical tablets will be discussed in another, separate part of this review. 

The question that remains to be discussed here is Furuli’s claim that the lunar positions that 

were observed in the 37 th year of Nebuchadnezzar and are recorded on VAT 4956 fit the 

year 588/587 better than 568/567 BCE. 

DO THE LUNAR POSITIONS RECORDED ON VAT 4956 FIT 588/587 

BETTER THAN 568/567 BCE? 

On the back cover of his new book Rolf Furuli states that the conclusion of his study is that 

“the lunar data on the tablet [VAT 4956] better fit 588 than 568 B.C.E., and that this is the 

37 th year of Nebuchadnezzar II.” What about this claim? 

A careful examination of all the legible lunar positions recorded on this astronomical “diary” 

proves that the claim is false. Almost none of the lunar positions recorded on VAT 4956 fit 

the year 588/587 BCE, while nearly all of them excellently correspond to lunar positions in 

the year 568/567 BCE. 

The astronomy program used for this examination is Chris Marriott’s SkyMap Pro 11.04, 

which uses the modern complete ELP2000-82B lunar theory. The “delta-T” value used for 

the secular acceleration of the Moon is 1.7 milliseconds per century, which is the result of 

the extensive research presented by F. Richard Stephenson in his Historical Eclipses and


Earth’s Rotation (Cambridge, 1997). The program used, therefore, maintains high accuracy far 

into the past, which is not true of many other modern astronomy programs. 

About a year before Furuli’s book had been published in the autumn of 2007 I had 

examined his claim (which he had published officially in advance) and found that none of 

the lunar positions fit the year 588/587 BCE. I shared the first half of my results with some 

of my correspondents. I did not know at that time that Furuli not only moves the 37 th year 

of Nebuchadnezzar 20 years back to 588/587 BCE, but that he also moves the 37 th year 

about one extra month forward in the Julian calendar, which actually makes it fall too late in 

that year. The reason for this is the following: 

On the obverse, line 17, VAT 4956 states that on day 15 of month III (Simanu) there was a 

“lunar eclipse that was omitted.” The phrase refers to an eclipse that had been calculated in 

advance to be invisible from the Babylonian horizon. 

On page 126 Furuli explains that he has used this eclipse record as the “point of departure” 

for mapping “the regnal years, the intercalary months, and the beginning of each month in 

the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II, both from the point of view that 568/67 and 588/87 

B.C.E. represent his year 37.” 

In the traditional date for the 37 th year of Nebuchadnezzar, this eclipse can easily be 

identified with the eclipse of July 4, 568 (Julian calendar). Thus the Babylonian date, the 15 th 

of month III, corresponds to July 4, 568 BCE. From that date we may count backward to 

the 1st of month III, which must have been June 20/21 (sunset to sunset), 568. As the 

tablet further shows that the preceding Month II (Ayyaru) had 29 days and Month I 

(Nisannu) 30 days, it is easy to figure out that the 1 st of Ayyaru fell on May 22/23, 568, and 

the 1 st of Nisannu (i.e., the 1 st day of year 37) on April 22/23, 568 BCE. 

On moving back 20 years to 588/87 BCE – the 37 th year of Nebuchadnezzar in Furuli’s 

alternative “Oslo Chronology” – we find that in this year, too, there was a lunar eclipse that 

could not be seen from the Babylonian horizon. It took place on July 15, 588 BCE. 

According to Furuli this is the eclipse that VAT 4956 dates to the 15 th of month III 

(Simanu). Reckoning backwards from July 15, Furuli dates the 1 st of month III to June 30, 

588; the 1 st of month II (Ayyaru) to June 1, 588, and the 1 st of month I (Nisannu) to May 1. 

(In his discussions and/or calculations he is inconsistently alternating between May 1, May 

2, and May 3). 

There are a number of problems with Furuli’s dates. The first one is that the first day of the 

Babylonian year, Nisannu 1, never began as late as in May! As shown by the tables on pages 

27-47 in R. A. Parker & W. H. Dubberstein’s Babylonian Chronology (Brown University Press, 

1956), the 1 st of Nisannu never once in the 700-year period covered (626 BCE – CE 75) 

began as late as in May. The same holds true of the subsequent months: the 1 st of Ayyaru 

never began as late as on June 1, and the 1 st of Simanu never began as late as on June 30. 

For this reason alone the lunar eclipse that VAT 4956 dates to the 15 th of month III cannot 

be that of July 15, 588 BCE! This eclipse must have fallen in the middle of month IV in the 

Babylonian calendar. Furuli’s “point of departure” for his “Oslo Chronology,” therefore, is 

quite clearly wrong. 

Very interestingly, the lunar eclipse of July 15, 588 BCE was recorded by the Babylonians on 

another cuneiform tablet, BM 38462, No. 1420 in A. Sachs’ LBAT catalogue, and No. 6 in 

H. Hunger’s Astronomical Diaries and Related Texts from Babylonia (ADT), Vol. V (Wien, 2001). 

I discussed this tablet on pages 180-182 of my book, The Gentile Times Reconsidered (3 rd ed. 

1998, 4 th ed. 2004). The chronological strength of this tablet is just as decisive as that of 

VAT 4956. It contains annual lunar eclipse reports dating from the 1 st to at least the 29 th 

regnal year of Nebuchadnezzar (604/603 – 576/575 BCE). The preserved parts of the tablet 

contain as many as 37 records of eclipses, 22 of which were predicted, 14 observed, and one 

that is uncertain. 

The entry containing the record of the July 15, 588 BCE eclipse (obverse, lines 16-18) is 

dated to year 17, not year 37, of Nebuchadnezzar! This entry reports two lunar eclipses in this


year, one “omitted” and one observed. The first, “omitted” one, which refers to the eclipse 

of July 15, 588, is dated to month IV (Duzu), not to month III (Simanu). So it cannot be the 

eclipse dated to month III on VAT 4956. That this eclipse really is the one of July 15, 588 is 

confirmed by the detailed information given about the second, observed lunar eclipse, which 

is dated to month X (Tebetu) of year 17. The details about the time and the magnitude help 

to identify this eclipse beyond all reasonable doubts. The whole entry reads according to H. 

Hunger’s translation in ADT V, page 29: 

“[Year] 17, Month IV, [omitted.] 

[Month] X, the 13 th , morning watch, 1 beru 5 o [before sunrise ? ] 

All of it was covered. [It set eclips]ed.” 

The second eclipse in month X – six months after the first – took place on January 8, 587 

BCE. This date, therefore, corresponded to the 13 th of month X in the Babylonian calendar. 

This agrees with Parker & Dubberstein’s tables, which show that the 1 st of month X 

(Tebetu) fell on 26/27 December in 588 BCE. The Babylonians divided the 24-hour day 

into 12 beru or 360 USH (degrees), so one beru was two hours and 5 USH (= degrees of four 

minutes each) were 20 minutes. According to the tablet, then, this eclipse began 2 hours and 

20 minutes before sunrise. It was total (“All of it was covered”), and it “[set eclips]ed,” i.e., it 

ended after moonset. What do modern computations of this eclipse show? 

My astroprogram shows that the eclipse of January 8, 587 BCE began “in the morning 

watch” at 04:51, and that sunrise occurred at 07:12. The eclipse, then, began 2 hours and 21 

minutes before sunrise – exactly as the tablet says. The difference of one minute is not real, 

as the USH (time degree of 4 minutes) is the shortest time unit used in this text. [The USH 

was not the shortest time unit of the Babylonians, of course, as they also divided the USH 

into 12 “fingers” of 20 seconds each.] The totality began at 05:53 and ended at 07:38. As 

moonset occurred at 07:17 according to my program, the eclipse was still total at moonset. 

Thus the moon “set while eclipsed.” 

Furuli attempts to dismiss the enormous weight of evidence provided by this tablet in just a 

few very confusing statements on page 127 of his book. He erroneously claims that the 

many eclipses recorded “occurred in the month before they were expected, except in one 

case where the eclipse may have occurred two months before.” There is not the slightest 

truth in this statement. Both the predicted and the observed eclipses agree with modern 

computations. The statement seems to be based on the gross mistakes he has made on the 

previous page, where he has misidentified the months on LBAT 1421 with disastrous results 

for his calculations. 

In the examination below, the lunar positions recorded on VAT 4956 are tested both for 

568/567 BCE as the generally accepted 37 th year of Nebuchadnezzar and for Furuli’s 

alternative dates in 588/587 BCE as presented on pages 295-325 of his book. 

Furuli has also tested the lunar positions for the year 586/585 BCE, one Saros period (223 

months, or 18 years + c. 11 days) previous to 568/567. As Furuli himself rejects this year as 

not being any part of his “Oslo Chronology”, I will ignore it as well as all his computations 

for that year (which in any case are far from correct in most cases). 

The record of the first lunar position on the obverse, line 1, of VAT 4956 reads: 

(1) Obv.´ line 1: “Year 37 of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon. Month I, (the 1 st of which 

was identical with) the 30 th (of the preceding month), the moon became visible behind the 

Bull of Heaven”. 

Nisannu 1 = 22/23 April 568 BCE: 

The information that the 1 st of Month I (Nisannu) was identical with the 30 th of the 

preceding month is given to show that the preceding lunar month (Addaru II of year 36, as 

shown also at Obv. line 5 of our text) had only 29 days. In 568 BCE the 1st day of Nisannu 

fell on 22/23 April (from evening 22 to evening 23) in the Julian calendar. After sunset (at c.


18:30) and before moonset (c. 19:34) on April 22 the new moon became visible c. 5.5 o east 

of (= behind) α Taurus, the most brilliant star in the constellation of Taurus (“the Bull of 

Heaven”). This is close enough to the position given on the tablet. 

Furuli’s date: Nisannu 1 = 1 st , 2 nd and 3 rd May 588 BCE: 

In 588 BCE day 1 of Nisannu fell on 3/4 April according to the modern calculations of the 

first visibility of the new moon after conjunction. Between sunset (at c. 18:18) and moonset 

(at c. 19:14) on April 3 the new moon became visible at the western end of the constellation 

of Taurus, about 14 o west of (= in front of) α Taurus. Thus the moon was clearly not behind 

the constellation of Taurus at this time. This position, therefore, does not fit that on the 

tablet. 

But as stated above, Furuli moves Nisannu 1 of 588 about one month forward in the Julian 

calendar, which is required by his identification of the lunar eclipse dated to month III on 

the tablet with the eclipse of July 15, 588. (Furuli, p. 296) This should have moved 1 

Nisannu to 3/4 May, 588 BCE, a date that is scarcely possible, as all the evidence available 

shows that 1 Nisannu never fell that late in the Julian calendar in the Neo-Babylonian or any 

later period. But Furuli goes on to make an even more serious error in connection with this 

relocation of Nisannu 1. 

On page 311 Furuli explicitly states that, “In order to correlate the Babylonian calendar with 

the Julian calendar, I take as a point of departure that each month began with the sighting of 

the new moon.” He goes on to explain that, due to bad weather conditions, the month 

could sometimes “begin a day after the new moon.” Despite this pronounced (and quite 

correct) point of departure, Furuli, in his discussion of the planetary positions on page 296, 

dates the 1 st of Nisannu in 588, not to 3/4 May but to May 1. He does not seem to have 

realized that this was not the date of the sighting of the new moon after conjunction. On 

the contrary, this date not only preceded the first sighting of the new moon by two days, but 

also the date of conjunction (the time of lunar invisibility) by one day! 

Later on, in the beginning of his discussion of the lunar positions on page 312, Furuli seems 

to have discovered that the May 1 date is problematic, because here he suddenly and 

without any explanation moves the beginning of 1 Nisannu in 588 forward, at first from 

May 1 to the evening of May 3, but finally, in the table at the bottom of the page, to the 

evening of May 2! Such manipulations of the Julian date for 1 Nisannu are, of course, 

inadmissible. One cannot have three different dates for 1 Nisannu in the same year! 

True, the conjunction did occur on 2 May, at c. 03:39 local time. (Herman H. Goldstein, 

New and Full Moons 1001 B.C. to A.D. 1651, Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 

1973, p. 35) But this does not mean that the new moon became visible on that day in the 

evening after sunset. For a number of reasons, the time interval between the conjunction 

and the first sighting of the new moon is considerable. As Dr. Sacha Stern explains, “the 

time interval between conjunction and first evening of visibility is often as long as one day 

(24 hours); it ranges however, at Mediterranean latitudes between a minimum of about 15 

hours and a maximum of well over two days.” (S. Stern, Calendar and Community, Oxford 

University Press, 2001, p. 100) The results of modern examinations of the first lunar 

crescents recorded on the Babylonian astronomical tablets from 568 to 74 BCE are 

presented by Uroš Anderlič, “Comparison with First Lunar Crescent Dates of L. Fatoohi,” 

available on the web at: 

http://www.univie.ac.at/EPH/Geschichte/First_Lunar_Crescents/Main-Comp-Fatoohi- 

Anderlic.htm . 

Thus the new moon could not be seen in the evening of 2 May, either. The earliest time for 

the visibility of the new moon was in the evening of 3 May, as stated above. Assuming that 

this incredibly late date for 1 Nisannu were correct, we find that the new moon did appear 

behind the constellation of Taurus in this evening (of May 3) between sunset (at c. 18:36) 

and moonset (at c. 20:05). But it was closer to the constellation of Gemini than to Taurus, 

so the position of the moon still does not fit very well.


In conclusion, the two dates for 1 Nisannu (1 st and 2 nd May) that Furuli actually uses in his 

computations are impossible. And should he have used May 3 as the date for 1 Nisannu, 

this would not have been of much help to him, as all the three dates are unacceptably late as 

the beginning of the Babylonian year. 

(2) Obv.´ line 3 says: “Night of the 9 th (error for: 8 th ), the beginning of the night, the moon 

stood 1 cubit [= 2 o ] in front of [= west of] β Virginis.” 

Nisannu 8 = 29/30 April 568 BCE: 

In 568 BCE the 8th of Nisannu fell on 29/30 April. In the beginning of the night on April 

29 the moon stood about 3.6 o northwest of β Virginis, or about 2 o to the west (in front of) 

and 3 o to the north of (above) the star. This agrees quite well with the Babylonian 

measurement of 2 o , which, of course, is a rather rough and rounded-off figure. 

Furuli’s date: Nisannu 9 = 11 May 588 BCE: 

As Furuli (incorrectly) dates 1 Nisannu to 2 May in 588, he should have dated the 8 th and 9 th 

of Nisannu to May 9 and 10, respectively. However, he moves the dates another day 

forward, to May 10 and 11, respectively, as is shown in his table at the bottom of page 313. 

Based on this error, he claims that, “On Nisanu 9 [May 11], the moon stood 1 cubit (2 o ) in 

front of β Virginis, exactly what the tablet says.” (Furuli, p. 313) 

But this is wrong, too. In the “beginning of the night” of 11 May 588 the moon stood, not 

to the west of (in front of), but far to the east of (behind) β Virginis (about 13 o to the east of 

this star at 20:00). To add to the mess, the altitude/azimuth position of the moon in Furuli’s 

two columns to the right in his table is wrong, too, as it shows the position near midnight, 

not at “the beginning of the night” as the tablet says. 

(3) Obv.´ line 8: “Month II, the 1 st (of which followed the 30 th of the preceding month), the 

moon became visible while the sun stood there, 4 cubits [= 8 o ] below β Geminorum.” 

Ayyaru 1 = 22/23 May 568 BCE: 

In 568 BCE the 1 st day of Month II (Ayyaru) fell on 22/23 May. The distance between 

sunset this evening (at c. 18:49) and moonset (at c. 20:46) was c. 117 minutes. This distance 

between the moon and the sun was long enough for the new moon to become visible while 

the sun still “stood there,” i.e., just above the horizon. At its appearance the new moon 

stood about 7.3 o south of (below) β Geminorum, which is very close to the position given 

on the tablet. 

Furuli’s date: Ayyaru 1 = 1 June 588 BCE: 

As Furuli has dated Nisannu 1 to 1 May, and later to 2 May, the 1 st of Ayyaru should fall one 

lunar month later. Furuli (p. 314) dates it to June 1. This, however, conflicts with his earlier 

dates, because if Nisannu 1 began in the evening of 1 May as he holds at first (p. 296), and if 

Nisannu had 30 days as the tablet says, he should have dated the 1 st of Ayyaru to May 31. 

But because he later on redates the beginning of Nisannu 1 to the evening of 2 May (p. 312), 

he is now able to date the 1 st of Ayyaru to 1 June. But as was pointed out earlier, the 2 May 

date for Nisannu 1 is unacceptable, too, as the moon did not become visible until 3 May. 

Furuli’s choice of 1 June seems to be due to the fact that the new moon could not be 

sighted until that day. It became visible at sunset (c. 18:56) about 9.7 o below β Geminorum. 

This is not “exactly 4 cubits below” this star, as Furuli states (p. 314), but close to 5 cubits 

below it. Yet this would have been an acceptable approximation, had the date been right. 

But it does not only conflict with Furuli’s dating of Nisannu 1 to 1 May; the month of 

Ayyaru never began as late as in June. In addition, the altitude/azimuth position Furuli gives 

in his table (+ 54 and 256) is also wrong, as it does not show the position of the moon at 

sunset, but at c. 15:16, when it was still invisible. Actually, Furuli’s figures for the 

altitude/azimuth position at the time of observation are so often erroneous that they will 

henceforth be ignored. The only detail that fairly corresponds to the statement on the tablet, 

then, is the position of the moon. Everything else is wrong.


(4) Obv.´ line 12: “Month III, (the first of which was identical with) the 30 th (of the 

preceding month), the moon became visible behind Cancer; it was thick; sunset to moonset: 

20 o [= 80 minutes]”. 

Simanu 1 = 20/21 June 568 BCE: 

In 568 BCE the 1 st day of Month III (Simanu) fell on 20/21 June. Day 1 began in the 

evening after sunset on June 20. At that time the new moon became visible behind (= east 

of) Cancer, exactly as the tablet says. According to my astro-program the distance from 

sunset to moonset was c. 23 o (= 92 minutes; from sunset c. 19:06 to moonset c. 20:38). This 

is not very far from the measurement of the Babylonian astronomers. The discrepancy of 3 o 

is acceptable in view of the primitive instruments they seem to have used. As N. M. 

Swerdlow has suggested, “the measurements could have been made with something as 

simple as a graduated rod held at arm’s length.” (N. M. Swerdlow, The Babylonian Theory of the 

Planets, Princeton University Press, 1998, pp. 40, 187) 

Furuli’s date: Simanu 1 = 30 June 588 BCE: 

As Furuli dated the 1 st of Ayyaru to June 1, and as the tablet shows that Ayyaru had 29 days, 

he should date the 1 st of Simanu to June 30, which he does. And it is true that we do find 

the moon behind Cancer on this date. Furuli states that “it was 6 o to the left (behind) the 

center of Cancer, so the fit is excellent.” But he has to add immediately that “it was so close to 

the sun that it was not visible.” (Furuli, p. 315. Emphasis added.) 

The reason is that the conjunction had occurred earlier on the very same day, at about 03:30. 

(H. H. Goldstine, op. cit., p. 35) In the evening the time distance between sunset (at c. 19:09) 

and moonset (at c. 19:32) was still no more than 23 minutes, i.e., less than 6 o , so the moon 

was too close to the sun to be visible. Furuli does not comment on the fact that the tablet 

gives the distance between sunset and moonset as much as 20 o (80 minutes), showing that 

the moon on Simanu 1 was far enough from the sun during the observation to be visible, 

contrary to the situation in the evening of June 30 in 588. For this reason alone Furuli’s date 

is disqualified. 

(5) Obv.´ line 14: “Night of the 5 th , beginning of the night, the moon passed towards the 

east 1 cubit [2 o ] the bright star at the end of the Lion’s foot [= β Virginis].” 


In 568 BCE the 5 th of Simanu fell on 24/25 June according to the tables of R. A. Parker & 

W. H. Dubberstein (Babylonian Chronology, 1956, p. 28). In the evening of the 24th, the moon 

passed towards the east c. 2 o north of γ Virginis, not of β Virginis. So here is a problem. 

Either the Babylonian scholar misnamed the star, or he misdated the observation by one 

day. In the previous evening (on the 23 rd ), the moon passed c. 4 o above (north of) β 

Virginis. Thus Johannes Koch translates the 5 th of Simanu into June 23 of the Julian 

calendar and calculates that in the evening that day at 22:36 the moon was 4 o 17´ above and 

0 o 55´ behind β Virginis. (See J. K och, “Zur Bedeutung von LÁL in den ‘Astronomical 

Diaries’ und in der Plejaden-Schaltregel,” Journal of Cuneiform Studies, Vol. 49, 1997, p. 88.) 

Furuli’s date: Simanu 5 = 4 July 588 BCE: 

Furuli dates the 5 th of Simanu to 4 July 588 BCE. He claims (p. 315) that on this date “the 

fit is excellent: the moon passed 1 cubit (2 o ) above β Virginis.” Unfortunately, it did not. 

When the Babylonian day began (at sunset, c. 19:10) the moon was already c. 2 ½ cubits (5 o ) 

behind (east of) β Virginis. It had passed above β Virginis about 12 hours earlier, in the 

morning before moonrise, but that would have been on Simanu 4, not on Simanu 5. So the 

fit is far from “excellent.” 

(6) Obv.´ line 15: “Night of the 8 th , first part of the night, the moon stood 2 ½ cubits [= 5 o ] 

below β Librae.”



In 568 BCE the 8 th of Simanu fell on 27/28 June. My astro-program shows that in the early 

night of June 27 the moon stood c. 4.5 o south of β Librae, which is very close to the 

position given on the tablet. 


Furuli, who dates the 8 th of Simanu to the 7th of July, 588 BCE, claims (p. 316) that the 

moon on that day “was 2 ½ cubits below β Librae, so the fit is excellent.” Again, Furuli is 

wrong. In the “first part of the night” on 7 July 588 BCE the moon stood as much as c. 6 

cubits (12 o ) west of (i.e., far from below) β Librae. It was in fact closer to the constellation of 

Virgo than to Libra. So Furuli’s date does not fit at all. 

(7) Obv.´ line 16: “Night of the 10 th , first part of the night, the moon was balanced 3 ½ 

cubits [= 7 o ] above α Scorpii.” 


In 568 BCE the 10 th of Simanu fell on 29/30 June. In the first part of the night of the 29 th , 

the moon stood about 8 o above (north of) α Scorpii, which is very close to the position 

described on the tablet. 


As Furuli had dated Simanu 8 to July 7, he should have dated Simanu 10 to 9 July 588. But 

strangely, he mistranslates it into 10 July and claims (p. 317): “The moon was 3 ½ cubits (7 o ) 

above α Scorpii, so the fit is excellent.” But in the “first part of the night” that day the moon 

was over 5 cubits (10 o ) northeast of α Scorpii. And even if we move back to the early night of 

July 9, the moon at that time was about 5 cubits (10 o ) northwest of α Scorpii. It would not be 

correct to state of any of these lunar positions that the “fit is excellent”. None of them fits. 

(8) Obv.´ line 17: “The 15 th , one god was seen with the other; sunrise to moonset: 7 o 30´ [= 

30 minutes]. A lunar eclipse which was omitted [….]” 

Simanu 15 = 4/5 July 568 BCE: 

In 568 BCE the 15 th of Simanu fell on 4/5 July. The expression “one god was seen with the 

other” refers to the situation when the sun and the moon are both visible at the same time 

when standing in opposition to each other. This was the situation in the early morning of 5 

July. From sunrise in the east at c. 04:51 to moonset in the west at c. 05:24, i.e., for about 33 

minutes, “one god was seen with the other.” This is very close to the time distance recorded 

on the tablet, 7 o 30´, or 30 minutes. 

Line 17 also records “a lunar eclipse which was omitted [….]”, an expression used of an 

eclipse that had been predicted in advance to be invisible from the Babylonian horizon. The 

text is somewhat damaged, but the reference is obviously to the lunar eclipse of July 4, 568 

BCE, which according to modern calculations began about 12:50 and lasted until 14:52, 

local time. As it took place in the early afternoon when the moon was below the horizon, it 

could not be observed in Babylonia. 


Furuli dates Simanu 15 to 15 July 588 BCE. True, there was a lunar eclipse on that day that 

was invisible from the Babylonian horizon. Furuli claims on page 317 that “the eclipses of 

July 15, 588; of July 4, 568; and of June 24, 586, all occurred on Simanu 15 and fit the 

description.” However, the time distances between sunrise and moonset at the dates in 588 

and 586 do not fit at all with the information on the tablet. On 15 July 588 the moonset (at 

04:50) occurred about five minutes before sunrise (04:55), so the two “gods” could not been 

seen with each other that day. And the same problem is connected with the June 24, 586 

BCE date. Of the three alternatives, therefore, only the July 4, 568 BCE date fits the 

information on the tablet.


In passing, Hunger’s translation of the obv.´ line 18 should be corrected. It says: “[…. the 

moon was be]low the bright star at the end of the [Lion’s] foot [….]” 

The signs within brackets are illegible and the text had to be restored by Hunger. But as he 

himself later explained, the word “moon” was just a guess that he had not checked. Modern 

calculations show that, if the day number (which is lost, too) was the 16 th (July 5/6), the 

heavenly body that was below “the bright star at the end of the Lion’s foot” (= β Virginis) 

must have been Venus, not the moon. This was later pointed out also by Johannes Koch 

(JCS 49, 1997, p. 84, n. 7, and p. 89). However, Koch calculates that Venus in the first part 

of the night of July 5 was 0 o 02ábove and 1 o 06´ behind β Virginis, while the SkyMap Pro 

11 program shows that Venus at that time was not 0 o 02ábove but about 0 o 64´ below and 

about 0 o 89´ behind β Virginis. These results are in closer agreement with the tablet. 

(9) ´Rev. line 5: “Month XI, (the 1 st of which was identical with) the 30 th (of the preceding 

month), the moon became visible in the Swallow; sunset to moonset: 14 o 30´ [58 minutes]; 

the north wind blew. At that time, Jupiter was 1 cubit behind the elbow of Sagittarius [….]” 

Shabatu 1 = 12/13 February 567 BCE: 

In 568/567 BCE the first day of month XI (Shabatu) fell on 12/13 February 567 BCE. On 

day 12 the distance between sunset (at c. 17:44) and moonset (c. 18:53) was 69 minutes (17 o 

15´), or 11 minutes (2 o 45´) more than those given on the tablet, 58 minutes. According to 

the tablet, the new moon became visible after sunset “in the Swallow.” 

The “Swallow” covered or included a part of the constellation of Pisces. The exact 

extension of the “Swallow” is not quite clear. But it included a band of stars called “DUR 

SIM-MAH (ribbon of the swallow)” which included at least δ, ε, and ζ Pisces, perhaps also 

some other stars. The “ribbon of the swallow” is referred to in over a dozen astronomical 

reports dating from 567 to 78 BCE, and these have been helpful in locating at least some 

stars in the group. (Alexander Jones, “A Study of Babylonian Observations of Planets Near 

Normal Stars,” Archive for History of Exact Sciences, Vol. 58, 2004, pp. 483, 490) The 

“Swallow”, then, comprised at least the “ribbon of the swallow” and then extended 

westward along the Pisces. 

Furuli’s discussion of SIM and SIM-MAH on page 296 is thoroughly misleading, as he tries 

to confuse the issue by referring to some older views without telling that they were 

abandoned long ago. This is true of Kugler’s suggestion back in 1914 that SIM-MAH 

applies to the northwest of Aquarius. To be sure, Furuli states that two modern scholars, E. 

Kasak and R. Veede, in an article published in 2001 applies SIM to “the Bull of Heaven” 

(Taurus). They do not! In their article (available on the web: 

http:/folklore.ee/folklore/vol16/planets.pdf) they do not mention SIM at all! Furuli also 

refers to the conclusion of van der Waerden (1974) that it applies to “the south-west part of 

Pisces” – as if this would be yet another view. The fact is that his conclusion does not 

conflict with that of other modern scholars, including that of Jones, Hunger, and Pingree. 

The impression Furuli tries to give, that modern experts widely disagree about the identity 

of SIM and SIM-MAH, is false. All agree that it covered or included a part of the 

constellation of Pisces. 

My astro-program shows that in the evening after sunset on February 12, 567 BCE, the new 

moon became visible in the Pisces, about half-way between α Pisces in the south and γ 

Pisces in the west and c. 8.5 o below the centre of the western bow of the Pisces. Furuli’s 

statement that the moon at this time was “13 o below the central part of Pisces” is not 

correct. His claim that the position is “a somewhat inaccurate fit” is totally uncalled-for, in 

particular in view of his statement that “the fit is excellent” when he finds the lunar position 

on his own preferred date (February 22, 587) to have been “9 o below the central part of 

Pisces.” 

There can be no doubt that the moon on February 12, 567 BCE was “in the Swallow,” just 

as is stated on the tablet. At that time Jupiter could also be seen in Sagittarius as the tablet 

says.


Furuli’s date: Shabatu 1 = 22 February 587 BCE: 

Furuli’s date for Shabatu 1 is 22 February 587 BCE. And it is true that the moon on that day 

was “in the Swallow.” One problem with this date, however, is that the new moon at sunset 

was so close to the sun (less than 10 o ) that it most probably was invisible. The conjunction 

had occurred earlier on the same Julian day, at c. 01:26. Besides, Jupiter was between Aries 

and Pisces, far away from Sagittarius where it is placed by the tablet. 

(10) ´Rev. line 12: “Month XII, the first (of which followed the 30 th of the preceding 

month), the moon became visible behind Aries while the sun stood there; sunset to 

moonset: 25 o [100 minutes], measured; earthshine; the north wind blew.” 

Addaru 1 = 14/15 March 567 BCE: 

In 568/567 BCE the first day of month XII (Addaru) fell on 14/15 March 567 BCE. On 

day 14 the distance between sunset (at c. 18:06) and moonset (at c. 19:50) was 104 minutes 

(26 o ), which is very close to the Babylonian measurement, 25 o (100 minutes). The distance 

between the moon and the sun was long enough for the moon to become visible before 

sunset (“while the sun stood there”). At that time the moon stood about 15 o southeast of α 

Aries, thus partially behind and partially below the most brilliant star in Aries. This roughly 

agrees with the position given on the tablet. 

Furuli’s date: Addaru 1 = 24 March 587 BCE: 

Furuli’s date for Addaru 1 is 24 March 587 BCE. Of the position of the moon Furuli says 

(p. 321): “The moon was 13 o to the left of (behind) Aries, so the fit is excellent.” This is not 

quite correct. About 86 minutes (c. 21.5 o ) before sunset (“while the sun stood there”), the 

moon stood about 7 o to the south of (below) the nearest star in Aries (δ Aries) and about 

20 o to the southeast of (i.e., partially below and partially behind) α Aries. This position is not 

very exact, but acceptable. 

(11) ´Rev. line 13: “Night of the 2 nd , the moon was balanced 4 cubits [8 o ] below η Tauri.” 


In 567 BCE the 2 nd of Addaru fell on 15/16 March. In the night of the 15 th , at c. 19:00, the 

moon was 4 cubits (8 o ) directly to the south of (below) η Tauri, also known as Alcyone, the 

most brilliant star in the star cluster Pleiades. This position agrees exactly with that given on 

the tablet. 


Furuli dates Addaru 2 to 25 March 587 BCE. In the night of that day, at c. 19:00, the moon 

was about 10.5 o southeast of η Tauri, a position that does not agree very well with that given 

on the tablet. The fit is definitely not “excellent” as Furuli (p. 321) claims it is. 

(12) ´Rev. line 14: “Night of the 7 th , the moon was surrounded by a halo; Praesepe and α 

Leonis [stood] in [it ….]” 


In 567 BCE the 7 th of Addaru fell on 20/21 March. In the night of the 20 th /21 st the moon 

stood between α Leonis and Praesepe, the latter being an open star cluster close to the 

centre of the constellation of Cancer. As they lie about 23 o apart, the halo must have 

covered a large area in the sky. The next line (line 15), in fact, goes on to state that “the halo 

surrounded Cancer and Leo.” As the moon stood between these two constellations, its 

position agrees with that given on the tablet. 

Furuli’s statement (p. 322) that Cancer “is either the constellation or the zodiacal sign that 

covers 30 o of the heaven” is anachronistic, as the zodiacal belt was not divided into signs of 

30 o each until much later, in the Persian era.



Furuli’s date for Addaru 7 is 30 March 587 BCE. He states that Cancer in that night “was 4 o 

above the moon and α Leonis was 13 o below the moon.” However, Cancer was not above 

but in front of (west of) the moon, and α Leonis was not below but behind (east of) the moon. 

But as this lunar position was nearly the same as on 20/21 March, 567 BCE, both positions 

fit. 

(13) ´Rev. line 16: “The 12 th , one god was seen with the other; sunrise to moonset: 1 o 30´ [6 

minutes]; ….” 


In 567 BCE the 12 th of Addaru fell on 25/26 March. According to the tablet sunrise 

occurred 1 o 30´ – 6 minutes – before moonset, meaning that one “god” could be “seen with 

the other” in the morning for six minutes. My astro-program shows that in the morning of 

March 26 the sun rose at c. 06:08 and the moon set c. 06:11, that is, they could both be seen 

at the same time above the horizon for about 3 minutes, which is close to the time given on 

the tablet. 

Furuli’s date: Addaru 12 = 4/5 April 587 BCE: 

Furuli has misunderstood the kind of phenomenon referred to by the expression “one god 

was seen with the other”. He explains on page 323: “To say that one god (the sun) was seen 

with the other god (the moon) was one way to express that the moon was full.” 

Although it is true that the moon was nearly full when it was seen with the sun, this is not 

exactly what the expression refers to. As explained earlier, it refers to the situation when the 

sun and the moon stand in opposition to each other – the sun in the east and the moon in 

the west – and both can be seen simultaneously above the horizon for a short period of time. As Furuli 

has not understood this, his comments on the text are mistaken and irrelevant. 

Furuli’s date for the 12 th of Addaru is 4/5 April 587 BCE. In the morning of April 5 the sun 

rose at c. 05:54. But the moon had already set at c. 05:13, i.e., about 41 minutes before 

sunrise. Thus one “god” could not be seen “with the other” this morning. Furuli’s date, 

then, is wrong. Only the 567 BCE date fits the statement on the tablet. 

In summary, at least 10 of the 13 lunar positions examined fit the 568/567 BCE date quite 

well, one (no. 10) is acceptable, while two (nos. 2 and 5) are acceptable only if the dates are 

moved back one day. Of Furuli’s dates in 588/587 BCE only one (no. 12) fits, while 9 do 

not fit at all. The fits of the remaining three (9, 10, and 11) are far from good but acceptable. 

The conclusion is, that the observations were made in 568/567 

BCE. The year 588/587 BCE is definitely out of the question. 

Part II: The Saturn Tablet BM 76738 + BM 76813 

The Saturn Tablet consists of two broken pieces, BM 76738 + BM 76813. It contains a list 

of last and first appearances of Saturn for a period of 14 successive years, namely, the first 

14 years of the Babylonian king Kandalanu, whose 22 years of reign is generally dated to 647 

– 626 BCE. As the examination below will demonstrate, the Saturn Tablet alone is sufficient 

for establishing the absolute chronology of the first 14 years of his reign. Every attempt by 

the Watchtower Society and its apologists to add 20 years to the Neo-Babylonian 

chronology is effectively blocked by this tablet. 

The Watchtower apologist Rolf Furuli in Oslo, Norway, strains every nerve to get rid of the 

evidence provided by this tablet in his new volume on chronology, Assyrian, Babylonian and 

Egyptian Chronology (Oslo: Awatu Publishers, 2007). The Watchtower Society’s chronology, 

renamed by Furuli the “Oslo Chronology”, requires that Nebuchadnezzar’s 18 th year, in 

which he desolated Jerusalem, is dated to 607 instead of 587 BCE. This would also move his 

father Nabopolassar’s 21-year reign 20 years backwards in time, from 625-605 to 645-625.


As the Saturn Tablet definitely blocks any change of this kind, it has to be reinterpreted in 

some way. Furuli has realized that he cannot simply wave it away as unreliable, as he does 

with so many other uncomfortable astronomical tablets. 

To overcome this problem Furuli tries to argue that Nabopolassar and Kandalanu is one 

and the same person. (Furuli, chapter 12, pp. 193-209) This idea will be discussed in some 

detail at the end of this article, but one of the problems with it is that the first year of 

Kandalanu is fixed to 647 BCE, not to 645 as is required by Furuli’s variant of the 

Watchtower chronology (the “Oslo Chronology”). To “solve” this problem, Furuli argues 

that there may have been not one but two years of interregnum before the reign of 

Nabopolassar. He also speculates that “a scribe could have reckoned his first regnal year one 

or two years before it actually started”! (Furuli, p. 340) He ends up lowering the first year of 

Nabopolassar/Kandalanu one year, from 647 to 646, claiming that the observations on the 

Saturn Tablet may be applied to this lowered reign. He believes his table E.2 on pp. 338-9 

supports this. However, as will be demonstrated in the discussion below, there is no 

evidence whatsoever in support of these peculiar ideas. His table bristles with serious 

mistakes from beginning to end. 

The Planet Saturn has a revolution of c. 29.46 years, which means that it returns to the same 

place among the stars at the same time of the year after twice 29.46 or nearly 59 years. Due to 

the revolution of the earth round the sun, Saturn disappears behind the sun for a few weeks 

and reappears again at regular intervals of 378.09 days. This means that its last and first 

visibility occurs only once a year at most, each year close to 13 days later in a solar year of 

365.2422 days, and close to 24 days later in a lunar year of 354.3672 days (12 months of 

29.5306 days), except, of course, in years with an intercalary month. 

EXAMINATION OF THE ENTRIES FOR THE FIRST 7 YEARS (14 

LINES) 

On the above-mentioned tablet each year is covered by two lines, one for the last and one 

for the first visibility of the planet. The tablet, then, contains 2 x 14 = 28 lines. As lines 3 

and 4 are clearly dated to the 2 nd year, the damaged and illegible sign for the year number in 

lines 1 and 2 obviously refers to the 1 st year of king Kandalanu. 

The text of lines 1 and 2: 

1´ [Year 1 of Kand]alanu, ´month´ […, day …, last appearance.] 

2´ [Year 1, mont]h 4, day 24, in fro[nt of … the Crab, first appearance.] 

Comments: 

As is seen, the last and first visibility of Saturn is dated to year, month, and day in the lunar 

calendar of the Babylonians. As the Babylonian lunar months began in the evening of the 

first visibility of the moon after conjunction, there are two mutually independent cycles that 

can be combined to test the correctness of the chronology: the lunar first visibility cycle of 

29.53 days, and the Saturn visibility cycle of 378.09 days. 57 Saturn cycles of 378.09 days 

make almost exactly 59 solar years. As explained by C. B. F. Walker, the translator of the 

tablet: 

“A complete cycle of Saturn phenomena in relation to the stars takes 59 

years. But when that cycle has to be fitted to the lunar calendar of 29 or 30 days then 

identical cycles recur at intervals of rather more than 17 centuries. Thus there is no 

difficulty in determining the date of the present text.” – C. B. F. Walker, 

“Babylonian Observations of Saturn during the Reign of Kandalanu,” in N. 

M. Swerdlow (ed.), Ancient Astronomy and Celestial Divination (Cambridge, 

Massachusetts, and London: 1999), p. 63. Emphasis added. (Walker’s article, 

with picture, is available on the web: 

http://www.caeno.org/_Eponym/pdf/Walker_Saturn%20in%20Kandalanu 

%20reign.pdf.)


The modern program used here for finding the last and first visibility of Saturn and 

the first visibility of the Moon (the latter is compared with the computations of 

Peter Huber used by C. B. F. Walker) is Planetary, Lunar, and Stellar Visibility 3, 

available at the following site: 

http://www.alcyone.de/PVis/english/ProgramPVis.htm 

As explained in the introduction to the program, exact dating of ancient visibility phenomena 

is not possible. While the margin of uncertainty in the calculations of the first visibility of 

the moon is no more than one day, it can be several days for some planets due to 

uncertainties in the arcus visionis, variations in the planetary magnitude, atmospheric effects, 

weather and other observational circumstances. For a detailed discussion of the 

uncertainties involved, see Teije de Jong, “Early Babylonian Observations of Saturn: 

Astronomical Considerations,” in J. M. Steele and Annette Imhausen (eds.), Under One Sky. 

Astronomy and Mathematics in the Ancient Near East (Münster: Ugarit-Verlag, 2002), pp.175- 

192. 

These factors “may introduce an uncertainty of up to five days in the predicted dates.” 

(Teije de Jong, op. cit., p. 177) A deviation of up to five days between modern calculations 

and the ancient observations of the visibility of planets in the period we are dealing with lies 

within the margin of uncertainty. It does not prove that our chronology for Kandalanu is 

wrong. Nor does it indicate that the ancient cuneiform records on the Saturn tablet are 

based on backward calculations instead of observations, as claimed by Rolf Furuli. A greater 

difference, however, of 6 days or more, would show that something is wrong. 

YEAR 1 = 647 BCE IN THE TRADITIONAL CHRONOLOGY: 

Lines 1 and 2: For 647 BCE – the date established for the 1 st regnal year of Kandalanu – 

the program shows that the last visibility of Saturn took place in the evening of June 14 and 

the first visibility in the morning of July 18. The Babylonian date in line 1 for the last visibility 

is damaged and illegible. The date in line 2 for the first visibility of Saturn, however, is stated 

to be month 4, day 24 in the Babylonian lunar calendar which, therefore, should correspond 

to July 18 in the Julian calendar. Does this Julian date synchronize with the lunar calendar 

date as stated on the tablet? As the Babylonian lunar months began in the evening of the 

first lunar visibility, we should expect to find that the 24 th day before July 18 fell on or close to 

a day of first lunar visibility. The 24 th day before July 18 brings us back to the morning of 

June 25, 647 BCE as day 1 of the 4 th Babylonian month. As the Babylonian day began in the 

evening of the previous day, the evening of June 24 should be the time of the first visibility 

of the moon after conjunction. And our program shows that this day was indeed the day of 

first lunar visibility: both the Julian date for Saturn’s first visibility and the stated Babylonian 

lunar calendar date are in harmony. 

YEAR 1 IN FURULI’S CHRONOLOGY = 646 BCE: 

In his revised chronology, Furuli not only claims that Kandalanu was just another name for 

Nabopolassar. He also moves the 1 st year from 647 to 646 BCE. How does this redating of the 1 st 

regnal year tally with the ancient record and modern computations? Could it be that C. B. F. 

Walker is wrong in stating that the dated Saturn phenomena recorded on the tablet recur on 

the same date in the Babylonian lunar calendar only after more than 17 centuries? 

Line 2: In 646 BCE the first visibility of Saturn occurred in the morning of July 31. If this 

was the 24 th day of the Babylonian month 4 as the text says, the 1 st day of that month would 

be the 24 th day before July 31. This brings us to the 8 th of July, and the previous evening of 

July 7 would be a day of first lunar visibility – if Furuli’s alternative date for regnal year 1 is 

correct. 

But it does not fit. According to the program, the day of first lunar visibility before July 31 

in 646 was July 13, not July 7. This is a deviation of 6 days, which is too much. The very first 

entry on the tablet contradicts Furuli’s revised chronology.



3´ [Ye]ar 2, month 4, day 10+[x, …, last appearance.] 

4´ [Year 2, mon]th 5, broken, in the head of the Lion, first appearance; not [observed?.] 

Comments: 

YEAR 2 = 646 BCE: 

Line 3: As is seen, both dates are damaged. But if the 2 nd regnal year was 646, as is 

conventionally held, the last visibility of Saturn that year occurred in the evening of June 28. 

According to the program, the previous first lunar visibility occurred in the evening of June 

13, which thus corresponded to the 1 st day of the Babylonian month 4. The last Saturn 

visibility on June 28, then, would be month 4, day 16 (= the damaged “day 10+”) in the 

Babylonian calendar. 

Line 4: As stated above, the first visibility of Saturn in 646 occurred in the morning July 31 

and the previous first lunar visibility fell in the evening of July 13. If July 13 was the 1 st day 

of month 5 in the lunar calendar, July 31 should have been day 18 (the “broken” day 

number) in the lunar calendar. 

We cannot know for sure if these restorations of the damaged day numbers are quite 

correct, but there is nothing in the text that contradicts them. 

Saturn is stated to have been “in the head of the Lion [SAG UR-A]”, which “in the Diaries 

from -380 onward … designates ε Leonis.” (Walker, op. cit., p. 72) My astro-program shows 

that Saturn at this time was almost on the same ecliptic longitude (104.5 o ) as ε Leonis 

(104.0 o ), but its latitude was about 9 o below (south of) the star. If the restoration of the last 

part of the line is correct (“not [observed?]”), the position was not observed but had to be 

calculated by the Babylonian scholar. This would explain the inexact latitudinal position. 

FURULI: YEAR 2 = 645 BCE: 

Line 3: “Year 2” in Furuli’s revised chronology is 645 BCE. The last visibility of Saturn in 

645 fell according to our program in the evening of July 10 and the previous first lunar 

visibility occurred in the evening of July 1. As July 1 was day 1 in the lunar calendar, July 10 

would have been lunar day 10. The damaged day number of the text (“10+”), however, 

shows that more than 10 days had passed from day 1 until the last visibility of Saturn. If the 

restored day number was “16” as argued above, this would be a deviation of 6 days from the 

true date. 

Line 4: The first visibility of Saturn in 645 took place in the morning of August 12. If that 

was day 18 of month 5 in the lunar calendar (as argued above), the previous first lunar 

visibility in the evening of lunar day 1 would have occurred in the evening of July 25. But 

the program shows that the first lunar visibility occurred in the evening of July 31. If the 

restored day number, 18, is correct, this is a deviation of 7 days. Besides, the position of 

Saturn does not tally with the text, either. While the difference in latitude between Saturn 

and ε Leonis was the same as in the previous year (about 9 o ), the ecliptic longitude of Saturn 

in the morning of August 12 was 117.5 o , which was 12.5 o behind (east of) the star (104.0 o ). 

This alone shows that Furuli’s alternative date for “year 2” is impossible. 


5´ [Ye]ar 3, month 4, day 7, [last appearance.] 

6´ [Year 3] month 5, day 16, in the Lion behind the King (= α Leonis), [first appearance]; 

´high´.

Comments: 

YEAR 3 = 645 BCE: 


Line 5: As is seen, the Babylonian months and days for both last and first appearances are 

preserved. The date established for year 3 of Kandalanu is 645 BCE. As stated above, the 

last visibility of Saturn in that year occurred according to our program in the evening of July 

10 and the first lunar visibility occurred in the evening of July 1. As July 1 was day 1 in the 

lunar calendar, “day 7” in the text would be July 7. However, the program dates the last 

visibility of Saturn to July 10, so there is a deviation of 3 days, which is not good but 

acceptable for the reasons explained earlier. The Babylonian astronomer(s) observed Saturn 

for the last time on day 7, although its actual disappearance did not occur until 3 days later. 

Line 6: According to the program, the first visibility of Saturn in 645 occurred in the 

morning of August 12, while the previous first lunar visibility took place on July 31 after 

sunset. If day 1 in the lunar calendar began in the evening of July 31, the recorded 

observation of Saturn on “day 16” must have occurred in the morning of August 16. The 

program, however, dates the first visibility of Saturn 4 days earlier, in the morning of August 

12. This deviation is great but may be explained. In fact, the reason seems to be given by the 

Babylonian observer himself by his adding of the sign for the word NIM, “high,” at the end 

of the line. The word indicates that the planet Saturn at the day of observation was already 

so high above the horizon that the actual reappearance had occurred some days before “day 

16” but had not been observed at that time, perhaps due to the weather. C. B. F. Walker 

explains: 

“NIM, high: this term indicates that when first observed the planet was 

higher above the horizon than normal for first visibility, leading to the 

conclusion that theoretical first visibility had taken place a day or two earlier, 

but had not been observed. See Huber (1982), 12-13.” – Walker, op. cit. 

(1999), p. 74. 

Teije de Jong points out that of the 28 records on the tablet “7 records are unreadable or 

incomplete because of textual damage, while 6 records are unreliable according to the 

professional annotations of the [Babylonian] observer (‘not observed’, ‘computed’ or ‘high’, 

i.e. visibility occurred a few days late, presumably because of cloudy skies on the expected day of first 

visibility).” – T. de Jong, op. cit., p. 178. Emphasis added. 

If the actual but unobserved first reappearance of Saturn had occurred “a few days” earlier 

than day 16 in the lunar calendar, the difference of 4 days would be reduced by a couple of 

days or more. 

The position of Saturn in the morning of observation (August 16, 645) is stated to be “in 

the Lion behind the King (= α Leonis)”, which is correct: The planet was 5 o behind (east of) 

α Leonis. 


Line 5: “Year 3” in Furuli’s revised chronology is 644 BCE. The last visibility of Saturn in 

644 took place in the evening of July 24, while, according to our program, the first lunar 

visibility prior to that date occurred in the evening of July 20. If lunar day 1 began in the 

evening of July 20, the last visibility of Saturn on day 7 in the lunar calendar should have 

occurred in the evening of July 26, 2 days later than shown by the program. This deviation 

would have been acceptable had it not been for the date of the first visibility of Saturn in the 

same year. 

Line 6: The first visibility of Saturn in 644 occurred in the morning of August 25, while the 

first lunar visibility before that date occurred in the evening of August 19. If the latter date 

was lunar day 1, the first visibility of Saturn in the morning of lunar “day 16” would have 

occurred on September 4. This is 10 days later than shown by the program. As the word 

“high” at the end of the line indicates that the actual reappearance of Saturn occurred 2 or 3 

days prior to lunar day 16, as argued above, this would still create a difference of 7 or 8 days.


This once again shows that 644 BCE is an impossible alternative for Kandalanu’s “Year 3”. 

It is true that Saturn at this time was “in the Lion behind the King (= α Leonis)”, but at a 

very long distance from the star: nearly 18 o east of α Leonis and just in front of σ Leonis. 


7´ [Year] ´4´, at the end of month 4, last appearance; (because of) cloud not observed. 

8´ [Year 4, month 6?], day [x], in the middle of the Lion, first appearance; high. 

Comments: 

YEAR 4 = 644 BCE: 

Line 7: Year 4 corresponds to year 644 in the traditional chronology. As stated above, the 

last visibility of Saturn this year occurred in the evening of July 24, and the first lunar 

visibility prior to that date occurred in the evening of July 20. Although the latter date was 

lunar day 1, it was not lunar day 1 of month 4 but of month 5. So we have to move back to 

the previous first lunar visibility in the evening of June 21. The “end” of this month 29 or 

30 days later would take us to July 19 or 20. One of these two dates corresponds to “the end 

of month 4” according to the text. This would be 4 or 5 days before the actual 

disappearance of Saturn in the evening of July 24. The reason for this difference is explained 

in the same line to be bad weather: “(because of) cloud not observed.” As the event could 

not be observed, it had to be calculated. 

Line 8: The first visibility of Saturn in 644 occurred on August 25. Unfortunately, the text 

on the tablet is so damaged at this place that neither month nor day numbers are readable. 

The only information in line 8 that can be checked by modern computations, therefore, is 

the position of Saturn, “in the middle of the Lion” (ina MURUB 4 UR-A). Its position in the 

morning of August 25 was c. 1.3 o in front of (west of) σ Leo. Although today that is at the 

rear of the constellation of Leo, the Babylonians also included β Virginis as a part of Leo, 

calling it GÌR ár šá A, “The rear foot of the Lion.” (A. Sachs/H. Hunger, Astronomical Diaries 

and Related Texts from Babylonia [= ADT], Vol. I, 1988, p. 18) Saturn, then, was well within 

Leo, although not quite in the middle. But as C. B. F. Walker comments, “in all probability 

ina MURUB 4 UR-A simply means within the constellation Leo.” (Walker, op. cit., 1999, p. 

72) 


Line 7: “Year 4” in Furuli’s revised chronology is 643 BCE. According to the program the 

last visibility of Saturn in 643 took place in the evening of August 5 and the previous first 

lunar visibility occurred in the evening of July 10. If July 10 was the 1 st day of month 4 in the 

lunar calendar, the end of that month 29 or 30 days later would fall in the evening of August 

7 or 8. That would be 2 or 3 days after the last visibility of Saturn. As the event could not be 

observed but had to be calculated by the Babylonian astronomers, this would have been 

acceptable had it not been for the recorded position of Saturn in the next line. 

Line 8: The first visibility of Saturn in 643 occurred in the morning of September 6. As 

stated above, the damaged and unreadable date on the tablet is useless. What about the 

position of Saturn “in the middle of the Lion” which, as we saw, fitted year 644? Does it 

also fit year 643? No, it does not. On September 6 in 643 Saturn had moved away from Leo 

into Virgo, 3.3 o behind (east of) β Virginis. Again, Furuli’s revised chronology disagrees with 

the tablet. 


9´ [Year 5], month 5, day 23, last appearance. 

10´ [Year 5], at the end of month 6, first appearance; intercalary Ululu.

Comments: 

YEAR 5 = 643 BCE: 


Line 9: Year 5 corresponds to year 643 in the conventional chronology. As stated above, 

the last visibility of Saturn this year occurred in the evening of August 5 and the previous 

first lunar visibility occurred in the evening of July 10. Thus, if lunar day 1 began in the 

evening of July 10, “day 23” in the text would have begun in the evening of August 1. This 

is 4 days earlier for the last visibility of Saturn than shown by the program, indicating that 

the actual last appearance of Saturn occurred a few days later than it could be observed for 

the last time by the Babylonian astronomers (perhaps due to bad weather). 

Line 10: As stated above, the first visibility of Saturn in 643 took place in the morning of 

September 6, which would correspond to “the end of month 6” as stated on the tablet. The 

beginning of the 6 th month 29 or 30 days earlier, then, would have been in the evening of 

August 7 or 8. And the program confirms that the first lunar visibility occurred in the 

evening of August 8 – an excellent fit! 


Line 9: Year 5 in Furuli’s revised chronology is 642 BCE. The last visibility of Saturn in 642 

took place in the evening of August 18 according to the program (August 17 according to 

the table of C. B. F. Walker, op. cit., p. 66). The previous first lunar visibility took place in the 

evening of July 28. If the latter was day 1 in lunar month 5, “day 23” would have been 

August 19. The difference is 1 (or 2) days, which is quite acceptable. But if this shall have 

any real value as evidence, the first visibility, too, must fit. 

Line 10: The first visibility of Saturn in 642 occurred in the morning of September 19 (day 

18 in Walker’s table). The previous first lunar visibility occurred, according to the program, 

on the evening of August 27. As that was lunar day 1, the “end of month 6” 29 or 30 days 

later would have been September 24 or 25. The first visibility of Saturn would have been in 

the next morning on September 25 or 26, that is, 6 or 7 (7 or 8) days after the actual event 

on September 19 (or 18) as shown by the program. As this is beyond the marginal of 

uncertainty, it is unacceptable. Furuli’s revised chronology is once again disproved. 


11´ Year 6, month 5, day 20, last appearance. 

12´ [Year 6], month 6, day 22, behind ´the rear foot of’ the Lion (= β Virginis), behind 

AN.GÚ.ME.MAR, first appearance. 

Comments: 

YEAR 6 = 642 BCE: 

Line 11: The 6 th year of Kandalanu is dated to 642 BCE. The last visibility of Saturn that 

year occurred in the evening of August 18 (August 17 in Walker’s table). The previous first 

lunar visibility took place in the evening of July 28. If this was lunar day 1, “day 20” of 

month 5 would have begun in the evening of August 16. This is only 2 days before the date 

of the program (August 18) and 1 day before the date in Walker’s table (August 17). 

Line 12: As stated above, the first visibility of Saturn in 642 occurred in the morning of 

September 19 (day 18 in Walker’s table), and the first lunar visibility prior to this date took 

place in the evening of August 27. If lunar day 1 began in the evening of August 27, “day 

22” of month 6 began in the evening of September 17, with the first visibility of Saturn 

occurring in the next morning of September 18. The deviation from the date of the program 

and from Walker’s table is 1 and 0 days, respectively. 

The text says that Saturn at this time was “behind ´the rear foot of’ the Lion (= β 

Virginis)”. It is true that the Saturn was behind (east of) it, but it was far behind the star, c. 

15.6 o , and it was even 2.2 o behind γ Virginis. It seems that the scribe mixed up the two stars.


The reason may be the fact that Saturn was also very close to and in line with Mercury and 

Jupiter, so the observer may have had difficulties in identifying the faint star in the 

immediate vicinity of the three planets. (See also Walker’s comments, op. cit., p. 73.) 


Line 11: Year 6 in Furuli’s revised chronology is 641 BCE. The last visibility of Saturn in 

641 took place in the evening of August 29, and the previous first lunar visibility on August 

15 according to the program. If this was day 1 of lunar month 5, “day 20” of that month 

would have begun in the evening of September 3, a difference of 5 days from that given by 

the program for the last visibility of Saturn. 

Line 12: The first visibility of Saturn in 641 took place in the morning of September 30 

(Walker, September 29). The previous first lunar visibility took place in the evening of 

September 14 according to the program. If lunar day 1 began in the evening that day, “day 

22” must have begun in the evening of October 5, with the first visibility of Saturn taking 

place in the next morning on October 6. That is 5 (or 6) days later than shown by the 

program (and Walker’s table). 

Still worse, Saturn was neither “behind ´the rear foot of’ the Lion (= β Virginis)” as stated in 

the text, nor in the vicinity of γ Virginis. It was on almost exactly the same ecliptic longitude 

as α Virginis (167.2 o ) and only 4 o above (north of) it, but more than 14 o behind γ Virginis 

and over 28 o behind β Virginis! This clearly disagrees with the position recorded on the 

tablet and refutes the year 641 as being year 6 of Kandalanu. 


13´ Year 7, month 6, day 10+(x), last appearance. 

14´ [Year 7], month 7, day 15, ín front of´ the Furrow (α+ Virginis), first appearance. 

Comments: 

YEAR 7 = 641 BCE: 

Line 13: The 7 th year of Kandalanu is dated to 641 BCE. As stated above, the last visibility 

of Saturn that year took place in the evening of August 29, with the first lunar visibility prior 

to that date taking place in the evening of August 15. The day number is damaged, but is 

evidently higher than 10. If August 15 was day 1 in the lunar calendar, the evening of 

August 29 would correspond to the beginning of Babylonian day 15 of month 6. We 

cannot know for sure, of course, that this is the correct restoration of the damaged day 

number, but there is nothing that speaks against it. 

Line 14: As stated above, the first visibility of Saturn in 641 took place in the morning of 

September 30 (Walker, September 29). The previous first lunar visibility took place in the 

evening of September 14. With that as the beginning of lunar day 1, “day 15” (of month 7) 

must have begun in the evening of September 28, with the first visibility of Saturn taking 

place in the next morning on September 29. The difference from the date given by the 

program (and Walker’s table) is 1 (or 0) days. 

The position of Saturn at its first visibility on September 29 was according to the tablet “ín 

front of´ the Furrow α+ ( Virginis)”. As explained above, the astro -program shows that 

Saturn at this time was almost exactly on the same ecliptic longitude as α Virginis (167.2 o ) 

and only 4 o above (north of) it. Thus it was not ín front of´ it, as the text seems to say. 

However, the text is somewhat damaged at this point and to show this Walker has put the 

words “in front of” (ina IGI) within half brackets (something like ⌐ in front of ¬). Perhaps 

the damaged sign could also be restored as “above” (⌐ above ¬)? If this is possible, the 

problem would be solved.


Another possibility is that Venus and Saturn were confused. Venus, in fact, was 8 o “in front 

of” (= west of) α Virginis at this time. 


Line 13: Year 7 in Furuli’s revised chronology is 640 BCE. The last visibility of Saturn in 

640 occurred in the evening of September 10, and the previous first lunar visibility in the 

evening of September 3 according to the program. This would make the distance from the 

1 st of the lunar month 6 (September 3) to the last visibility of Saturn (September 10) only 7 

days. 

This conflicts with the tablet, which shows that more than 10 days (“10+[x]”) separated the 

two events. 

Line 14: The program shows that in 640 BCE the first visibility of Saturn occurred in the 

morning of October 12 (Walker, October 10). The previous first lunar visibility took place 

in the evening of October 3. If that was the beginning of day 1 in the lunar calendar, “day 

15” of month 7 would have begun in the evening of October 17, with the first visibility of 

Saturn occurring in the next morning on October 18. But this was 6 days after the date 

given by the program (October 12) and 8 days after Walker’s date (October 10). This 

deviation excludes year 640 as the 7 th year of Kandalanu. 

The position of Saturn is given on the tablet as “ín front of´ the Furrow α+ ( Virginis)”, 

which also seems to conflict with Furuli’s alternative chronology. Its position on October 12 

and 10 (and still on October 18) in 640 was about 12 o behind α Virginis, not in front of, 

above, or below the star. But as the signs are somewhat damaged here, this position is not 

decisive. 


Above the entries for the first seven years of Kandalanu have been examined. This is half of 

the entries on the tablet which covers 14 years in all. It is not necessary to tire out the reader 

with a detailed discussion of the remaining entries. The results for the whole period are 

presented in the two tables below. The tables show the results only for the entries with fully 

preserved dates (15 out of the 28 lines). The first table shows how these records tally with 

the traditional chronology, and the second table shows how they tally with Furuli’s revised 

dates.


In the “Deviation” column the results of C. B. F. Walker are given within parenthesis 

(W+/-). 

TABLE 1 

THE SATURN TABLET AND THE TRADITIONAL CHRONOLOGY 

YEAR BCE 

VISIBILITY DEVIATION POSITION OF SATURN 

1 = 647 first 0 days (W +1) text damaged 

3 = 645 last -3 days (W -3) correct (for first visibility) 

5 = 643 last -4 days (W -4) not given (for first visibility) 

6 = 642 last -2 days (W -1) 

6 = 642 first -1 day (W 0) erroneous? 

7 = 641 first -1 day (W 0) correct? (slightly damaged) 

8 = 640 last -3 days (W -3) 

8 = 640 first -5 days (W -2) correct 

10 = 638 last -4 days (W -3) 

10 = 638 first -1 day (W +1) correct 

11 = 637 last -3 days (W -2) 

11 = 637 first -1 day (W 0) correct 

12 = 636 first -3 days (W -2) correct 

13 = 635 first 0 days (W +1) correct 

14 = 634 last -3 days (W -2) not given (for first visibility) 

Comments: The deviations in all cases where the dates are preserved lie all within the 

margin of uncertainty, at most 5 days according to the web program, and even less 

according to Peter Huber’s calculations used by C. B. F. Walker. Where the positions of 

Saturn are given and the text is undamaged, the positions are correct except in one case 

(year 6 = 642 BCE), where the observer/scribe seems to have mistaken β Virginis for γ 

Virginis.

TABLE 2 

FURULI’S “OSLO CHRONOLOGY” 


YEAR BCE 

VISIBILITY DEVIATION POSITION OF SATURN 

1 = 646 first +6 days text damaged 

3 = 644 last +2 days wrong 

5 = 642 last +1 days not given 

6 = 641 last +5 days 

6 = 641 first +5 days wrong 

7 = 640 first +6 days wrong? (slightly damaged) 

8 = 639 last +1 day 


10 = 637 last +4 days 


11 = 636 last +4 days 




14 = 633 last +6 days not given 

Comments: 6 of the 15 deviations are outside the margin of uncertainty. The positions of 

Saturn do not fit, either. Of the 8 years in which the recorded positions are legible, 7 are 

clearly in conflict with the tablet, and the 8 th may be wrong, too. This is “year 7” in Furuli’s 

chronology, and the recorded position is slightly damaged and may partly have been 

misread. 

In year 12 Saturn should have been “at the beginning of Pabilsag [= Sagittarius + part of 

Ophiuchus]”. This fits year 636 BCE, but not 635 (Furuli’s date for year 12). As the study of 

the astronomical tablets has shown, the western part of Pabilsag included θ Ophiuchus, 

which was thus “at the beginning of Pabilsag”. (A summary of the examination of the 

Babylonian constellations and the stars attached to them by the Babylonian astronomers is 

included in a separate Appendix in Hermann Hunger & David Pingree, Astral Sciences in 

Mesopotamia [Leiden-Boston-Köln: Brill, 1999], pp. 271-277.) 

In 635, however, Saturn had moved away from Ophiuchus altogether to about the middle 

of Pabilsag. In year 13 Saturn should have been “in the middle of Pabilsag”. This fits year 

635 BCE, but in 634 (Furuli’s date for year 13) Saturn had moved away also from the middle 

of Pabilsag and was close to the eastern end of Pabilsag. 

The conclusion is that Furuli’s attempt to move the reign of Kandalanu one year forward 

cannot be upheld astronomically. His revised chronology is demonstrably wrong. 

So what about Furuli’s attempt to identify Kandalanu with Nabopolassar?


WAS KANDALANU ANOTHER NAME FOR NABOPOLASSAR? 

Furuli’s “Oslo/Watchtower Chronology” requires that twenty years are added to the Neo- 

Babylonian chronology somewhere after the reign of Nebuchadnezzar. This, of course, 

would not only move the reign of Nebuchadnezzar twenty years backwards. It would also 

move the 21-year reign of his father Nabopolassar twenty years backwards, from 625-605 

BCE to 645-625. As stated earlier, such changes are totally blocked by a number of 

astronomical tablets, including the Saturn Tablet. To overcome this problem, Furuli argues 

that Nabopolassar was no other than Kandalanu himself! In note 66 on page 56 he says: 

“In the Akitu Chronicle we find a description of the years 16-20 of Samasšuma-ukin. 

Then in line 24 we read ‘arki m Kan-da-la-nu’ (traditionally 

translated ‘after Kandalanu’) followed by ‘in the accession year of 

Nabopolassar.’ The Akkadian phrase that is translated as ‘after Kandalanu’ 

can also be translated as ‘thereafter Kandalanu’; thus we get ‘thereafter 

Kandalanu, in the accession year of Nabopolassar.’ The phrase can also 

mean ‘this other Kandalanu’ in contrast to some previous Kandalanu. In 

both cases, Kandalanu can be equated with Nabopolassar.” 

Thus Furuli not only claims that Kandalanu was Nabopolassar, but he also tries to argue 

that the phrase arki Kandalanu refers to his accession year. In arguing this Furuli ignores the 

fact that two other cuneiform texts use the same phrase, arki Kandalanu, not for his 

accession year but for a continuing artificial count of his reign after his death! As discussed earlier, the 

last of these tablets is dated to shattu 22 kam arki Kandalanu, i.e., “year 22 after Kandalanu.” – J. 

A. Brinkman & J. A. Kennedy, op. cit., p. 49. This alone invalidates Furuli’s argument. On 

page 16 of the same article Brinkman and Kennedy give some other, earlier examples of this 

posthumous dating method. See also the comments by Grant Frame in Babylonia 689-627 

B.C. A Political History (Leiden: Nederlands Historisch-Archaeologisch Instituut te Istanbul, 

1992), pp. 287, 288. 

A second problem with Furuli’s identification is that Kandalanu’s posthumous “22 nd ” year 

was a year of unrest, when several pretenders to the throne fought for power. The Uruk 

King List gives 21 years to Kandalanu and assigns the next year to two Assyrian pretenders, 

Sin-shum-lishir and Sin-shar-ishkun. (GTR4, pp. 105-107) Similarly, the Babylonian King 

List A, which covers the period from the first dynasty of Babylon to the beginning of the 

Chaldean Dynasty, shows that Kandalanu was followed by Sin-shum-lishir. Unfortunately 

the list breaks at this point, but it seems likely that it also mentioned Sin-shar-ishkun. – D. 

O. Edzard (ed.), Reallexikon der Assyriologie und vorderasiatische Archäologie, Vol. VI (Berlin, New 

York: Walter de Gruyter, 1980), p. 93. 

The 21-year reign of Nabopolassar, however, was not followed by a period of unrest and 

war in Babylonia. On the contrary the Babylonian Chronicle BM 21946 shows that the 

transfer of power from Nabopolassar to his son and successor Nebuchadnezzar was 

peaceful and without problems. That part of the chronicle says: 

“For twenty-one years Nabopolassar ruled Babylon. On the eighth day of 

the month Ab he died. In the month of Elul Nebuchadnezzar (II) returned 

to Babylon and on the first day of the month he ascended the royal throne in 

Babylon.” (Grayson, Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles, 1975, pp. 99, 100; cf. 

GTR4, p. 102) 

At the death of Nabopolassar in 605 BCE the Assyrian empire was gone, so no Assyrian 

kings existed that could try to take over the power in Babylonia after his death. The political 

events following the death of Kandalanu and the death of Nabopolassar were wholly 

different, which once again prove that the two kings cannot have been identicial. 

Finally, the intercalary months known from the reigns of the two kings do not agree either, 

which would have been the case if the two royal names referred to the same king. In the 

tables below “U” means “Ululu II” (the second 6th month), and “A” means “Addaru II” 

(the second 12th month). The third column gives the number of tablets with attested


intercalary months from each year with such months. The question marks in Kandalanu’s 

column 2 indicate that it cannot be determined whether the intercalary month in 

Kandalanu’s year 2 was a second Ululu or a second Addaru. For his year “13/14” Walker’s 

list adds: “yr 13 12b or yr 14 6b”. 

KANDALANU 

Year U or A No. of tablets 

2 (?) 1 

5 U 2 

8 U 1 

10 A 2 

13/14 (?) 1 

19 U 5 

22 x) U 1 

x) Kan 22 = Npl acc. 

NABOPOLASSAR 

Year U or A No. of tablets 

2 A 3 

5 U 3 

7 A 4 

10 U 5 

12 A 4 

15 U 4 

18 xx) U 5 

20 A 8 

xx) PD’s year 19 is erroneous. See Kennedy, 

JCS 1986, p. 211. 

The tables are based on an unpublished list worked out by C. B. F. Walker. My copy is dated 

March 18, 1996. Walker’s list also shows an intercalary Addaru II for year 1 of 

Nabopolassar, based on D. A. Kennedy’s list in Journal of Cuneiform Studies, Vol. 38, 1986, p. 

179, T.1.14 and p. 222. But after collation in 1990 Walker told me that the royal name is 

Nabonidus, not Nabopolassar as stated in Kennedy’s list. (Letter Walker-Jonsson, Nov. 13, 

1990) Walker simply forgot to remove this tablet from his own list. 

As the tables show, the two kings had only one clearly dated intercalary month in common: 

the Ululu II in year 5. If the intercalary month in year 2 of Kandalanu was an Addaru II, this 

would raise the number to two. But still, most of the intercalary months in the two reigns 

disagree. This fact in itself definitely disproves Furuli’s theory that the two kings were 

identical.


In summary, the discussion above has demonstrated that Furuli’s revised chronology for 

Kandalanu and Nabopolassar is astronomically and historically untenable and has to be 

rejected. 

ADDENDUM TO MY REVIEW PART II: THE SATURN TABLET BM 

76738+76813 

As discussed above, Rolf Furuli tries to overcome the evidence presented by the Saturn 

Tablet from the reign of Kandalanu by arguing that Kandalanu was identical with 

Nabopolassar. This idea has already been refuted above. But one of the arguments used by 

Furuli was not dealt with. On pages 329-331 of his Vol. 2 Furuli questions Chris Walker’s 

restoration of the royal name in line 1, obverse, as “(Kand)alanu”. (C. B. F. Walker, 

“Babylonian Observations of Saturn During the Reign of Kandalanu,” in N. M. Swerdlow 

(ed.), Ancient Astronomy and Celestial Divination, London: The MIT Press, 1999, pp. 61-76) 

Walker restores/transliterates/translates line 1 as follows: 

1´ [MU 1-KAM kan-d)a-⌐la-nu ITU¬-[x U 4 x-KAM ŠÚ] 

1´ [Year 1 of Kand]alanu, ⌐month¬ […, day …, last appearance.] 

Furuli, however, claims that (the sign for) nu in line 1 “looks more like [the sign for] pap” 

and argues: 

“If the sign of line 1 is pap, the name of the king could be d AG.IBILA.PAP (Nabopolassar) 

rather than Kan-da-la-nu. The space of the piece that is broken away in line 1 and the small 

part of the sign visible before the sign pap or nu corroborate both names.” (Furuli, p. 331) 

Is this correct? Can Furuli’s “observations” be trusted? One of my correspondents 

forwarded Furuli’s statements to a professional Assyriologist and expert on cuneiform, Dr. 

Jon Taylor at the British Museum, and asked him to check line 1´ on the original tablet. In 

an email dated August 28, 2008, Dr. Taylor answered: 

“Dear … , 

with broken text it is always a little difficult to make definitive statements. The traces do let 

me say the following, however: 

1) the last sign of the name is a perfectly good NU; one can compare the other examples of 

NU in this text. It does not fit the traces one would normally expect for PAP. 

2) the previous sign does fit the traces of LA. It does not fit the traces of IBILA. 

Given the above, Kandalanu is the most reasonable reading. I can’t imagine of a writing that 

would allow a reading Nabopolassar. 

Best wishes, 

Jon” 

Part III: Are there about 90 “anomalous tablets” 

from the Neo-Babylonian period? 

There are only two possible ways of extending the Neo-Babylonian period to include the 20 

extra years required by the Watchtower Society’s chronology, and therefore also by Rolf 

Furuli’s so-called “Oslo Chronology”: (1) Either the known Neo-Babylonian kings ruled 

longer than indicated by Berossus, the Royal Canon (often misnamed “Ptolemy’s Canon”), 

and the Neo-Babylonian cuneiform documents, or (2) there were other, unknown kings 

who belonged to the Neo-Babylonian period in addition to those established by these 

ancient sources. Virtually all arguments set forth by Watchtower apologists like Rolf Furuli 

belong to one or both of these two categories. Upon closer examination, however, the 

arguments used turn out to be nothing but grasping at straws.


In chapter 3 of his second volume on chronology Furuli discusses the many dated contracts 

(business, legal, and administrative documents) from the Neo-Babylonian period (626-539 

BCE). As tens of thousands of such dated tablets have been found from this 87-year period, 

there are hundreds of tablets dated to each of these years. Yet no tablets have been found so 

far that are dated to any of the 20 years that the Watchtower Society has added to the 

period. This creates an enormous problem for its chronology and therefore also for Furuli’s 

“Oslo Chronology.” Even if one or two tablets would be found one day with an odd year, 

this would not solve the problem, because thousands of tablets dated to this 20-year period 

should have been found. As Furuli himself admits, “one or two contradictory finds do not 

necessarily destroy a chronology that has been substantiated by hundreds of independent 

finds.” (Furuli, Persian Chronology and the Length of the Babylonian Exile of the Jews, Oslo, 2003, p. 

22) The only reasonable explanation of a couple of such oddly dated tablets would be that 

the dates contain scribal errors. 

Although no contract tablets have been found that add any extra years to the Neo- 

Babylonian period, there are some tablets that seem to add a few days, weeks, or – in two 

cases – some months to the known Neo-Babylonian reigns. Such odd dates may create a 

short overlap between the last year of a king and the accession-year of his successor. Furuli, 

who claims he has found “about 90” tablets from the Neo-Babylonian period with 

“anomalous dates” (pp. 65, 86), tries to use such short overlaps to argue that extra years 

should be inserted between the two kings. He says on page 18: 

“The natural conclusion to draw when the first tablets of one king’s 

accession are dated earlier than the last tablets of the predecessor’s last year, 

is that the successor’s accession year is not the same as the predecessor’s year 

of death. In the case of Nebuchadnezzar II and Evil-Merodach such a 

conclusion would have destroyed Ptolemy’s chronology, and therefore the 

aforementioned scholars [R. H. Sack, D. J. Wiseman, S. Zawadzki] did not 

consider this most natural possibility.” 

Furuli’s conclusion is far from being the “most natural” explanation of the short overlaps 

between the reigns of some Neo-Babylonian rulers. Nor have scholars rejected it because it 

“would have destroyed Ptolemy’s chronology,” as if the king list popularly but erroneously 

named “Ptolemy’s Canon” were the only or best evidence we have about the Neo- 

Babylonian reigns. The best evidence is provided by much earlier documents, including the 

cuneiform tablets, many of which are contemporary with the Neo-Babylonian period itself. 

The principal reason why modern scholars so highly regard the above-mentioned king list, 

more correctly known as the “Royal Canon,” used by Claudius Ptolemy and other ancient 

astronomers, is the fact that it agrees with the chronology established by earlier sources, 

including the cuneiform documents contemporary with the Neo-Babylonian and Persian 

periods. 

These earlier sources include the lengths of Neo-Babylonian reigns attested by Berossus’ 

Babyloniaca, the Uruk king list, and Neo-Babylonian royal inscriptions; by prosopographical 

evidence provided by contemporary cuneiform documents, chronological interlocking joints 

provided by a number of contemporary tablets, synchronisms with the chronology of the 

contemporary 26 th Egyptian dynasty, numerous Neo-Babylonian absolute dates established 

by at least ten astronomical cuneiform tablets, and also the Biblical information about the 

length of the reign of king Nebuchadnezzar. (2 Kings 24:12; 25:27) It is quite 

understandable that scholars who are aware of this enormous burden of evidence see no 

reason to accept Furuli’s far-fetched explanation of the brief overlaps of a few days, weeks, 

or months between some of the reigns of the Neo-Babylonian rulers. 

In fact, most of the “odd dates” quoted by Furuli are not odd at all. Fresh collations have 

shown that most of them either contain scribal errors or have been misread by modern 

scholars, or have turned out to be modern copying, transcription, or printing errors. Furuli 

cautions against accepting dates uncritically, pointing out on page 54 that “dates that fall 

outside the traditional schemes must be very clear in order to be accepted.” That is why it is


necessary to have supposedly “oddly dated” tablets collated afresh. Furuli quotes three 

examples from scholarly works of tablets that were found to have been misread by modern 

scholars. 

Unfortunately, Furuli himself has not applied his “word of caution” to his own research. In 

the tables on pages 56-64 he presents a number of seemingly oddly dated tablets from the 

Neo-Babylonian period, most of which on fresh collation turn out to have been 

misinterpreted or misread. The question is why he has used these tablets in support of his 

“Oslo chronology” without having them collated. Basing a radical revision of the 

chronology established for one of the chronologically best established periods in antiquity 

on unchecked misreadings and misinterpretations of the documents used does not speak 

very well about the quality of the research performed. 

Let us first take a look at the traditional chronology for the Neo-Babylonian dynasty: 

Kings: Lengths of reign: Years BCE: 

Nabopolassar 21 years 625-605 

Nebuchadnezzar 43 years 604-562 

Awel-Marduk 2 years 561-560 

Neriglissar 4 years 559-556 

Labashi-Marduk 2-3 months 556 

Nabonidus 17 years 555-539 

In the following discussion we will take a close look at each accession of a new monarch 

during the Neo-Babylonian period and the “overlaps” of reigns Furuli believes he has 

found. 

(1) Kandalanu to Nabopolassar 

Before Nabopolassar’s conquest of Babylon in 626 BCE the city and the country had been 

controlled by Assyria for most of the previous 120 years. After the death of the Assyrian 

king Esarhaddon in 669 BCE the Assyrian empire was ruled by two of his sons, 

Assurbanipal in Assyria and Šamaš-šum-ukin in Babylonia. After the death of Šamaš-šumukin 

in 648 BCE, Babylonia was ruled by an Assyrian puppet-king named Kandalanu, who 

died in his 21 st regnal year, in 627 BCE. Assurbanipal to all appearances died in the same 

year. 

The death of Kandalanu was followed by a period of general disorder and war between 

several pretenders to the throne in Babylon. One of them was Nabopolassar, the founder of 

the Neo-Babylonian dynasty, who succeeded in freeing Babylon from Assyrian control late 

in 626. The Babylonian chronicle BM 25127 states of the transition from Kandalanu to 

Nabopolassar: 

“For one year there was no king in the country. In the month of Arahsamnu 

[= month VIII], the twenty-sixth day, Nabopolassar ascended to the throne” 

[= Nov. 23, 626 in the Julian calendar]. (Jean-Jacques Glassner, Mesopotamian 

Chronicles, Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2004, p. 217) 

The Uruk king list, however, gives the kingless year to two Assyrian combatants, Sin-šumlišir, 

a high Assyrian official, and Sin-šar-iškun, a son of Assurbanipal. Some scribes spanned 

the same year by artificially extending Kandalanu’s reign for another year after his death, the 

last of these tablets (BM 40039) being dated to day 2 of month VIII, shattu 22 kam arki 

Kandalanu, i.e., “year 22 after Kandalanu.” This tablet, which is from Babylon, is dated 24


days before Nabopolassar was enthroned in that city on day 26 of month VIII according to 

the chronicle. – J. A. Brinkman & D. A. Kennedy, “Documentary Evidence for the 

Economic Base of Early Neo-Babylonian Society,” Journal of Cuneiform Studies, Vol. 35 

(1983), p. 49. 

Despite the different ways of spanning the year of interregnum, the year intended is the same 

in all these sources and corresponds to 626. Nabopolassar’s 1 st year of reign began on Nisan 

1 next year, 625 BCE. 

Furuli claims that the date of Nabopolassar’s accession given by the Babylonian chronicle, 

day 26 of month VIII, is contradicted by two economic tablets that date his accession 

earlier: 

“One tablet is dated to day 10 of month IV of his accession year, and 

another tablet, NCBT 557, which probably is from the reign of 

Nabopolassar, is dated to day ? in month II of his accession year”. (Furuli, p. 

55) 

In footnote 62 on the same page Furuli points out that the signs for the royal name on the 

second tablet are damaged and “could refer to Nabû-apla-iddina from the ninth century. 

However, no other economic texts are that old, so Beaulieu believes that the king is Nabûapla-usur. 

This is accepted here.” This would create an overlap of about six months between 

the first tablet dated to Nabopolassar and the last tablet dated to arki (“after”) Kandalanu: 

Months 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 

arki Kandalanu 

Nabopolassar’s 

acc. year 

first 

date: 

II/?/acc. 

last date: 

VIII/02/22 

enthroned: 

VIII/26/acc. 

This is the first example where Furuli applies his thesis that an overlap of a few weeks or 

months between a king and his successor means that one or more extra years should be 

inserted between the two kings. He says: 

“If we take the chronicle text that mentions one year without king at face 

value, there are not one but two lunisolar years between Nabopolassar and 

the king who preceded him.” (Furuli, p. 56) 

With respect to reading the royal name on NCBT 557 as Nabopolassar rather than Nabûapla-iddina 

(887-855 BCE), Furuli has misunderstood Beaulieu. He does not say that “no 

other economic texts are that old.” The fact is that several economic texts have been found 

from the reign of Nabû-apla-iddina. On his web site (presently unavailable) Janos Everling 

listed 17 texts dated to the reign of Nabû-apla-iddina that had been published up to 2000. 

Of the texts in which the provenance is preserved all except one are from Babylon. The 

exception, OECT 1, pl.20f:W.-B. 10, seems to be from Uruk. What Beaulieu says is that no 

other tablets from Uruk have been found from his reign. (Paul-Alain Beaulieu, “The fourth 

year of hostilities in the land,” Baghdader Mitteilungen, Vol. 28, 1997, p. 369.) The text dated to 

day 10 of month IV of Nabopolassar’s accession year, PTS 2208, is from Uruk, and so is 

also NBCT 557 from the 2 nd month. 

If both of these tablets really belong to Nabopolassar, there is still no contradiction 

between their dates and the statement in the Babylonian chronicle BM 25127 that 

Nabopolassar was officially installed on the throne in Babylon some months later. As 

Beaulieu points out in the same article, “Uruk may have originally been the power base of 

Nabopolassar, and perhaps even his native city.” This had previously also been argued by 

Assyriologist W. G. Lambert. (Beaulieu, p. 391 + n. 56) If Nabopolassar’s rebellion started 

in Uruk, it is reasonable to conclude that he was first recognized as king there before he, 

after his capture of Babylon, could be installed on the throne in that city. This is a far more


natural explanation of the “overlap” than Furuli’s theory that the “most natural” explanation 

of such overlaps is that “extra years” are to be added, an explanation that conflicts with 

other sources from the period and therefore must be rejected. 

Two kingless years instead of one before Nabopolassar would not, of course, add any extra 

years to the Neo-Babylonian period, as this period began with Nabopolassar. Furuli’s “Oslo 

Chronology” requires that 20 extra years are added after the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, because in 

this chronology the desolation of Jerusalem in his 18 th year is pushed back from 587 to 607 

BCE. The result of this is that the 21-year reign of his father Nabopolassar is pushed back 

from 625-605 to 645-625 BCE. And this in turn would also push the beginning of 

Kandalanu’s reign 20 years backward, from 647 to 667 BCE. 

Such a lengthening of the chronology, however, is blocked by astronomy. There are several 

cuneiform tablets containing records of astronomical observations dated to specific regnal 

years within the Neo-Babylonian period and earlier. One such tablet that consists of two 

broken pieces, BM 76738 and BM 76813, records consecutive observations of the positions 

of the planet Saturn at its first and last appearances dated to the first fourteen years of 

Kandalanu (647-634 BCE). Assyriologist C. B. F. Walker, who has examined and translated 

this tablet, points out that identical cycles of Saturn observations dated to the same dates 

within the Babylonian lunar calendar “recur at intervals of rather more than 17 centuries.” 

(C. B. F. Walker, “Babylonian observations of Saturn during the Reign of Kandalanu,” in N. 

M. Swerdlow [ed.], Ancient Astronomy and Celestial Divination, Cambridge, Massachusetts, and 

London: The MIT Press, 2000, pp. 61-76.) In other words, the reign of Kandalanu is so 

firmly fixed by this tablet that it cannot be moved backwards or forwards even one year, far 

less 20. 

To overcome this evidence, Furuli argues that Nabopolassar was no other than Kandalanu 

himself! According to this theory, the Saturn tablet moves the reign of Nabopolassar about 

20 years backwards and identifies it with the reign of Kandalanu! (Furuli, pp. 128, 129, 329- 

343) This theory has been discussed and thoroughly refuted in Part II of this review. 

(2) Nabopolassar to Nebuchadnezzar 

According to the Babylonian Chronicle BM 21946 (= Chronicle 5 in A. K. Grayson, 

Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles, 1975, pp. 99-102; henceforth referred to as “Grayson, 

ABC”) the transition from Nabopolassar to his son and successor Nebuchadnezzar was 

smooth and unproblematic. Furuli starts by referring to this chronicle: 

“According to the Babylonian Chronicle 5, 9-11, Nabopolassar died on day 8 

in month IV of his year 21, and Nebuchadnezzar II ascended to the royal 

throne on day 1 in month VI in the same year.” (Furuli, p. 57) 

But Furuli immediately goes on to mention one tablet that seemingly creates a problem: 

“However, there may be some problems with this succession as well. For 

example, there is one tablet dated after the death of Nabopolassar, on day 20 

in month V of his year 21 (PTS 2761).” (Furuli, p. 57) 

If Nabopolassar died “on day 8 in month IV”, how could a tablet still be dated to his reign 

42 days (one month and 12 days) later, “on day 20 of month V”? 

Unfortunately Furuli, undoubtedly accidentally, has misquoted the Babylonian Chronicle. It 

does not say that Nabopolassar died “in month IV” but in month V: 

“For twenty-one years Nabopolassar ruled Babylon. On the eighth day of 

the month Ab [= month V] he died. In the month Elul [= month VI] 

Nebuchadnezzar (II) returned to Babylon and on the first day of the month 

Elul he ascended the royal throne in Babylon.” (Grayson, ABC, pp. 99, 100) 

The tablet PTS 2761, then, is dated, not 42 but only 12 days after the death of 

Nabopolassar. Is this really an “overlap” with the reign of Nebuchadnezzar?


When his father died, Nebuchadnezzar was occupied with a military campaign in Syria (and, 

probably, Palestine). When he was informed about the death of his father, Nebuchadnezzar 

hastened back to Babylon as fast as he could (by crossing the desert with a few companions, 

according to Berossus). He was enthroned, says the Chronicle, on Elul 1, i.e., 22 days after his 

father’s death. As tablet PTS 2761 is dated 10 days before Nebuchadnezzar’s coronation, it 

does not witness to any overlap between the two kings. It was only natural for the scribes to 

continue to date their documents to Nabopolassar until his successor had arrived and been 

installed on the throne. 

Furuli, finally, refers to four other tablets that give dates both in the reign of Nabopolassar 

and in the reign of Nebuchadnezzar: 

“Some tablets also mention both Nabopolassar and Nebuchadnezzar: BM 

92742 mentions month II, year 21, of Nabopolassar, and month VII, 

accession year of Nebuchadnezzar; BM 51072 mentions year 21 of 

Nabopolassar, and year 4 of Nebuchadnezzar; RSM 1889.103 mentions year 

21 of Nabopolassar, and years 1-4 of Nebuchadnezzar; BE 7447 mentions 

day 24, month XII, accession year of Nebuchadnezzar, and year 19 of 

Nabopolassar.” (Furuli, p. 57) 

It is strange that Furuli refers to these tablets, as none of them indicates there was an 

overlap between the two kings. Furuli admits that, “The data suggest that Nebuchadnezzar 

started to reign in the same year that his father died,” yet he goes on to claim that “the data 

above may also suggest that there was some kind of coregency, or that there was one year 

between them.” 

It is clear that Furuli has not checked any of these four tablets, which he also indirectly 

admits by stating in note 68 on the same page (p. 57) that all tablets are mentioned in the 

catalogue by D. A. Kennedy published in the Journal of Cuneiform Studies, Vol. 38/2, 1986, pp. 

211, 215. Only one of the dates on each tablet refers to the date of the tablet. The other 

dates refer to events dealt with in the text. The last of the four tablets (BE 7447), for 

example, deals with the purchase of a house in Babylon. The tablet is dated on day 24 of 

month XII, accession-year of Nebuchadnezzar, but it ends with the information that 

payment for the house had been received about two years earlier, on the 24 th of month VIII 

in the 19 th year of Nabopolassar. (Eckhard Unger, Babylon, Berlin und Leipzig: Walter de 

Gruyter & Co., 1931, pp. 308, 309) Nothing of this suggests “some kind of coregency” or 

an extra year between these kings. 

As the data presented by Furuli do not suggest anything of this, his statement is nothing but 

unfounded wishful thinking, contradicted by all the evidence we have about the transition of 

reign from Nabopolassar to Nebuchadnezzar. 

(3) Nebuchadnezzar to Evil-Merodach (Awel-Marduk) 

(A) The “ledger” NBC 4897: 

Furuli deals with the transfer of reign from Nebuchadnezzar to his son Evil-Merodach on 

pages 57-59 of his book. He starts by commenting on the cuneiform tablet NBC 4897, a 

“ledger” covering ten successive years, from the 37 th year of Nebuchadnezzar to the 1 st year 

of Neriglissar. The “ledger,” which is briefly discussed on pages 131-133 in my book, The 

Gentile Times Reconsidered (4 th edition, 2004; hereafter referred to as GTR4), stretches a 

chronological bridge between the reigns of Nebuchadnezzar, Evil-Merodach, and 

Neriglissar. Furuli, of course, cannot accept the clear witness of this “ledger”: 

“To the best of my knowledge, there is just one cuneiform tablet, NBC 

4897, whose contents can be used to argue that Evil-Merodach succeeded 

Nebuchadnezzar II in his year 43, that Evil-Merodach reigned for 2 years, 

and that Neriglissar succeeded him in his second year. However, a close 

scrutiny of that tablet shows that it has little value as a chronological 

witness.” (Furuli, p. 57)


These statements contain two errors. Firstly, as far as the transition from Nebuchadnezzar to 

Evil-Merodach is concerned, I presented not just one but four different cuneiform tablets, all 

of which show that Evil-Merodach succeeded Nebuchadnezzar in his 43 rd regnal year. 

(GTR4, pp. 129-133) Furuli has chosen to ignore all but one of the four tablets. Secondly, 

his claim that NBC 4897 “has little value as a chronological witness” is false. His few critical 

assertions on the next page (58) are followed by a reference to “Appendix A for a detailed 

analysis of the contents of NBC 4897.” This Appendix with its slanted analysis and baseless 

conclusions will be critically examined in another part of this review. 

(B) Biblical versus Babylonian dating methods: 

Furuli next tries to find support in the Bible for his idea that Nebuchadnezzar ruled longer 

than 43 years. He refers to the first capture of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, which the 

Babylonian Chronicle BM 21946 dates to his “seventh year.” The Chronicle states that in 

this year the king of Babylon “encamped against the city of Judah and on the second day of 

the month Adar he captured the city (and) seized (its) king,” that is, king Jehoiachin, the 

next to the last king of Judah. – Grayson, ABC, p. 102. 

As the month Adar was the 12 th and last month of the Babylonian regnal year, Jehoiachin 

was taken prisoner nearly a whole month before the end of Nebuchadnezzar’s seventh 

regnal year. 

The Bible gives a similar description of the same events at 2 Kings 24:10-12: 

”At that time the servants of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon came up to 

Jerusalem and the city was besieged. King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon came 

to the city while his servants were besieging it; King Jehoiachin of Judah 

gave himself up to the king of Babylon, himself, his mother, his servants, his 

officers, and his palace officials. The king of Babylon took him prisoner in 

the eighth year of his reign.” 

Both records emphasize that the Judean king was “seized” or “taken” prisoner, but only the 

Babylonian Chronicle gives the month and day of the event, showing it happened nearly one 

month before the end of Nebuchadnezzar’s seventh year. The most conspicuous difference, 

however, is that according to the Biblical book of 2 Kings it happened, not in the seventh but in 

the eighth year of Nebuchadnezzar. The best explanation of this one-year difference is, as 

many scholars have argued, that Judah did not apply the accession-year system but counted 

the year of accession as the first regnal year. (GTR4, pp. 314-320; see also the detailed and 

convincing discussion by Dr. Rodger Young: 

http://home.swbell.net/rcyoung8/jerusalem.pdf ) 

Furuli gives no explanation for this one-year difference between the Biblical and Babylonian 

way of counting regnal years but chooses to ignore the date of the Babylonian Chronicle. 

This enables him to increase the reign of Nebuchadnezzar from 43 to 44 years. He says: 

“Jeremiah 52:28-31 mentions that Jehoiachin was released from prison in 

year 37 of his exile, in the year when Evil-Merodach became king. The word 

galut means ‘exile,’ and the most likely starting point of the period of 37 years 

must be when Jehoiachin came to Babylon and his exile started or, less likely, 

when he was captured. Both events occurred in year 8 of Nebuchadnezzar, and 37 

years from that time would end in year 44 of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign and 

not in year 43 when he is supposed to have died.” (Furuli, p. 58. Emphasis 

added. In footnote 70 on the same page Furuli approvingly quotes J. 

Morgenstern’s calculation of the 37 th year, but he ignores the fact that 

Morgenstern held that the Judean regnal years were counted from Tishri, not 

Nisan.) 

However, the one-year discrepancy between the Babylonian and Biblical way of counting 

regnal years cannot be ignored. As has often been pointed out, the same discrepancy is also 

found elsewhere in the Bible. Another example is the battle at Carchemish, when Pharaoh


Necho of Egypt was decisively defeated by Nebuchadnezzar “in the fourth year of King 

Jehoiakim.” (Jeremiah 46:2) This “fourth year of king Jehoiakim” is equated with “the first 

year of King Nebuchadnezzar” at Jeremiah 25:1. 

The same Babylonian Chronicle quoted above (BM 21946) also records this decisive battle 

at Carchemish. But there it is dated, not to the first year of Nebuchadnezzar but to the 21 st 

and last year of his father Nabopolassar. At that time Nebuchadnezzar is still said to be “his 

eldest son (and) the crown prince.” Later in the same year Nabopolassar died, and 

Nebuchadnezzar succeeded him in what from then on is called his “accession year,” not his 

first year as does Jeremiah. – Grayson, ABC, pp. 99, 100. 

When, therefore, the Bible dates the battle at Carchemish to the first year of 

Nebuchadnezzar, this has to be understood as his accession-year in the Babylonian dating 

system. And when the Bible states that Jehoiachin was taken prisoner and brought into exile 

in the eighth year of Nebuchadnezzar, this has to be understood as his seventh year in the 

Babylonian accession year system. As Jehoiachin’s exile began in the 7 th year of 

Nebuchadnezzar, the 37 th year of exile covered parts of the 43 rd regnal year of 

Nebuchadnezzar and the accession-year of Evil-Merodach. When the difference between 

the Biblical and Babylonian methods of reckoning regnal years is taken into consideration, 

the Bible and the extra-Biblical documents are seen to be in full agreement. Only by 

ignoring this difference is Furuli able to increase the reign of Nebuchadnezzar from 43 to 44 

years. (For a more detailed discussion of this difference, see GTR4, pp. 314-320.) 

(C) Nine supposedly “anomalous tablets” from the accession year of Evil-Merodach 

In a table on page 59 (“Table 3.3”) Furuli lists nine tablets from the accession year of Evil- 

Merodach that he claims are dated before the last tablets dated to the reign of his father 

Nebuchadnezzar. He concludes: 

“These nine tablets represent strong evidence in favour of an expansion of 

the years of the Neo-Babylonian Empire.” (Furuli, p. 59) 

The table starts with five tablets dated to month IV and four tablets dated to month V of 

Evil-Merodach’s accession year, followed by three tablets dated to months VI, VIII, and X 

of Nebuchadnezzar’s 43 rd regnal year. If all these 12 dates were real, they would indicate an 

overlap between the reigns of Nebuchadnezzar and Evil-Merodach of six months. 

Furuli’s table, however, is totally misleading. The main reason for this is that Furuli has not 

cared to collate the dates on the original tablets, nor has he asked professional experts on 

cuneiform to do this for him. Had he done this, he would have discovered that most of the 

dates he has published are wrong. 

The first five tablets in his table, dated to month IV of the accession year of Evil-Merodach, 

are: 

Month/day/year: 

Tablet no.: 

IV/?/acc. BM 66846 

IV (orVI)/?/acc. BM 65270 

IV/5/acc. BM 65270 

IV/20/acc. BM 80920 

IV/29/acc. UCBC 378 

All tablets except the last one is listed in the British Museum’s CBT catalogues Vols. VI- 

VIII, 1986-1988. (CBT = Catalogue of the Babylonian Tablets in the British Museum.) The dates on 

the BM tablets were collated afresh already back in 1990, with the following results:


BM 66846: 

When C. B. F. Walker at the British Museum collated the date on this tablet back in 1990 he 

found that the day number is “1”, but that the month name is damaged and illegible. The 

tablet, therefore, does not support the date given in Furuli’s table, IV/?/acc. (C. B. F. 

Walker, “Corrections and additions to CBT 6-8,” 1996, p. 6) 

BM 65270 (listed twice): 

Strangely, Furuli lists this tablet twice, with three different dates! This confusion is probably 

due to the fact that the month is damaged and difficult to read. After repeated collations 

Walker stated that “it is perhaps most likely that the month is 7 rather than 4.” (Letter 

Walker-Jonsson, Nov. 13, 1990; cf. GTR4, p. 323, n. 28; see also Walker in “Corrections 

…,” 1996, p. 5: “the month is damaged; possibly month 7; not month 6 as previously 

suggested.”) On p. 1 of his “Corrections” list of 1996 Walker gives the following warning: 

“Note that in Neo-Babylonian texts there is always the possibility of 

confusion (because of inaccuracy in either reading or writing) between 

months IV, VII and XI, between months V and X, and between months IX 

and XII. The handbooks which suggest that these month-names are clearly 

distinguishable in the cuneiform script do not give warning of the range of 

possible error that arises from sloppy, defective or cursive writing. Readings 

which are critical for chronology should be collated again and again, 

preferably by different Assyriologists experienced in working with Neo- 

Babylonian texts.” 

Another Assyriologist, Stefan Zawadzki, also collated tablet BM 65270. He rejects month 4 

(IV) and translates the date on the tablet as “the fifth [day] of the month Ululu/Tašritu(?) 

[month 6 or 7] of the accession year of Amel-Marduk, king of Babylon.” (Stefan Zawadzki, 

“Two Neo-Babylonian Documents from 562 B.C.,” Zeitschrift für Assyriologie, Band 86, 1996, 

p. 218) 

BM 80920: 

The date, IV/29/acc., is that read by R. H. Sack in his work on Evil-Merodach (Amel- 

Marduk 562-560 B.C. [= AOATS 4], 1972, text no. 56). The CBT VIII catalogue, p. 245, 

however, has month VII, and on collation Walker found that the latter is correct. The 

month is 7, not 4, thus VII/20/acc. “AOAT 4 no. 56 is to be corrected,” he says. (Walker, 

“Corrections …”, 1996, p. 8; see also GTR4, p. 323, n. 28.) 

UCBC 378: 

The fourth tablet in Furuli’s table, UCBC 378, dated to “IV.29.00” in the copy by Henry 

Frederick Lutz, was published in 1931. (H. F. Lutz, Selected Cuneiform Texts, Berkeley: 

University of California Press, 1931, pp. 53 + 94, 95.) The full number of the published text 

is “UCP 9-1-2, 29.” The present museum number is HMA 9-02507 (HMA = Hearst 

Museum of Anthropology). The number used by Furuli, “UCBC 378,” was a provisional 

number used by Lutz, who kept the tablets in his office and used his own number system 

before the tablets he translated were officially accessioned. 

A transliteration with a translation by R. H. Sack was published in 1972 as text No. 70 in 

Sack’s work on Evil-Merodach (op. cit., pp. 99-100). R. H. Sack does not seem to have 

checked the original tablet, but based his translation on H. Lutz’s copy. Sack, too, gives the 

same date as Lutz, “month of Du’uzu [month 4], twenty-ninth day, accession year of Amel- 

Marduk, king of Babylon.” 

In order to have the original tablet collated afresh, a correspondent of mine sent an email to 

Niek Veldhuis, Associate Professor of Assyriology at the Department of Near Eastern 

Studies, University of California, Berkeley, and asked if the date may have been misread by 

Lutz. In an email dated October 3, 2007, Veldhuis said:


“I looked at the piece yesterday and you may very well be right. The two 

month names (4 and 7) are rather similar in cuneiform writing, one written 

SHU, the other DU6. The tablet is eroded and the sign is not very clear. I 

have little experience in this period – so I’ll have to look at it again, but I can 

certainly not exclude reading DU6 (that is, month 7).” 

Thus the date on this tablet, too, is damaged, and the month may very well be 7, not 4. The 

claim that the date is anomalous, then, cannot be proven. 

In conclusion none of these tablets can be shown to be dated as early as month IV of the 

accession year of Evil-Merocach. The earliest tablet from his reign with a clear date is still 

BM 75322, dated to month V, day 20 of his accession year, as is also shown in GTR4, pp. 

323, 324. 

What about the three tablets dated to the reign of Nebuchadnezzar after the accession of 

Evil-Merodach in month V? According to Furuli’s table, these three tablets are dated to 

months VI, VIII, and X of the 43d year of Nebuchadnezzar: 


VI/26/43 

Tablet no.: 

Contenau XII.58 

VIII/?/43 Krückmann 238 

X/?/43 BM 55806 

I will start with the last of the three tablets. 

BM 55806: 

Back in 1987 I wrote to Professor D. J. Wiseman in London and asked him to collate about 

20 oddly dated tablets I had found listed in the then recently published BM catalogue CBT 

VI (1987). Wiseman checked all the 20 tablets and sent me his observations in a letter dated 

October 7, 1987. Most of the dates turned out to be modern printing or reading errors. 

With respect to the date of 55806, X/?/43, Wiseman said that, “The reading seems to be ab 

(is this an error for shu?).” 

Ab is month V, and Shu (SHU = Du’uzu) is month IV. 

The tablet was also collated in 1990 by C. B. F. Walker, who gives the following comments 

in his list of “Corrections …,” p. 3: 

“Month appears to be written ITU.AD; year number highly uncertain, and 

partly erased. Pinches, CT 55, 138, copied ITU.AB = month 10. If the year 

is really 43 then the month must be understood as AD = Abu.” 

As shown by Walker’s comments, the date is severely damaged. Not only the day and the 

month, but also the year is highly uncertain. (This is actually admitted by Furuli himself on 

page 18!) Walker’s mentioning of CT 55 refers to volume 55 of a series of BM publications, 

Cuneiform Texts from Babylonian Tablets in the British Museum. Vols. 55, 56, and 57 contain 

economic texts copied by T. G. Pinches during the years 1892-1894, published 90 years later 

by the British Museum Publications Ltd in 1982. As shown above, collations of the original 

tablet by modern specialists show that Pinches evidently misread the month name, which 

most probably is V rather than X. The tablet cannot be shown to be dated after the 

accession of Evil-Merodach. 

Krückmann 238: 

“Krückmann” refers to Oluf Krückmann, Neubabylonishe Rechts- und Verwaltungstexte, 

published in Leipzig 1933. It is also referred to as TuM 2/3 as it is Vol. 2/3 in the series 

Texte und Materialien der Frau Professor Hilprecht Collection of Babylonian Antiquities im Eigentum der 

Universität Jena. Vol. 2/3 contains copies of 289 cuneiform tablets, many of which are 

fragmentary. In a chronological table the tablets are briefly described, and when the dates, or 

at least parts of them, are legible, they are given in three separate columns (giving month,


day, and year, respectively). No. 238 is listed on page 16 as one of the tablets dated to 

Nebuchadnezzar. The date is evidently very fragmentary, as Krückmann has put both the 

month and the year within parenthesis, while the day number is shown as illegible: 

Monat Tag Jahr 

(IX) – (42) 

As can be seen, the suggested year number is "42", not "43". 

So why does Furuli date the tablet to VIII/?/43? The reason obviously is that Furuli has 

never consulted Krückmann’s work. As I demonstrated in my review of volume I of Furuli’s 

work on ancient chronology, most of the dates presented in his tables had been simply 

borrowed from web lists published by the Hungarian Assyriologist Janos Everling. 

Everling’s lists (presently not available on the web) were based upon works that had been 

published all the way from the latter part of the 19 th century and up to about 2000. The lists 

contain over 7,000 tablets from the Neo-Babylonian period alone. In the introduction to 

his lists Everling explicitly warned that the dates in the lists had neither been proof-read nor 

been compared with the original tablets. The result is that Everling’s lists contain numerous 

errors. In my review of Furuli’s volume I it was shown that he had borrowed extensively 

from Everling’s lists without collations, with the result that the errors in Everling’s lists were 

repeated in Furuli’s tables. 

This is also true of Everling’s reference to Krückmann 238, whom he misquotes as follows: 

“TuM 2/3, 238. (Nbk. 43.08.o, )” 

Furuli seems to have simply taken the date from Everling’s lists without collation and 

without checking Krückmann’s work. If he had done anything of this, he would have 

discovered that Everling had misquoted Krückmann 238. 

Contenau XII.58: 

The date of this tablet, VI/26/43, is correct and is the latest dated tablet from the reign of 

Nebuchadnezzar. As the earliest known tablet from the accession year of Evil-Merodach is 

dated to V/20/acc (BM 75322), the overlap between the two rulers is reduced from six 

months as shown by Furuli’s tables to one month and 6 days, as is also shown in GTR4, 

page 324. As I argued on the same page, the reason for this brief overlap probably is that 

Nebuchadnezzar had died earlier, but that Evil-Merodach’s accession was not generally 

accepted immediately due to his wicked character. Some scribes, therefore, continued to 

date their tablets to the reign of Nebuchadnezzar for a few weeks. This is a much more 

natural explanation of the “overlap” than the idea that “extra years” have to be added 

between the two reigns – an idea that conflicts with all other relevant sources from this 

period. 

(4) Evil-Merodach to Neriglissar 

“90 anomalous tablets”? 

As mentioned earlier, Rolf Furuli has repeatedly claimed, both in this book (pp. 65, 86) and 

elsewhere, that there are about 90 “anomalous tablets” that contradict the traditional Neo- 

Babylonian chronology and therefore requires an extension of this chronology. On page 86 

he states that these 90 tablets are “mentioned in chapter 3.” About a dozen of such claimed 

anomalous tablets have already been discussed above, nine of which were presented in 

Furuli’s Table 3.3 on page 59. Fresh collations by competent scholars showed that most of 

them did not have any “anomalous dates” at all. 

The longest table with such claimed “anomalous dates” however, is Table 3.4 on pages 60- 

62. It starts in the first two columns with 17 tablets, continuously dated in each of the 

months II, III, IV and V of the 2 nd and last year of Evil-Merodach, the last of the tablets 

being dated to V/17/02 (month 5, day 17, year 2). These dates are then followed in the next 

two columns by 37 tablets, continuously dated in each of the months V, VI, VII, VIII and


IX of the accession year of Neriglissar, the first tablet being dated to V/21/acc. or just four 

days after the last tablet from the reign of Evil-Merodach. This strongly indicates that the 

transition from Evil-Merodach to Neriglissar took place in the latter part of month V of 

Evil-Merodach’s 2 nd year. 

However, Furuli also lists nine other tablets that do not seem to fit into this pattern. The 

first two are dated in the first and early second months of Neriglissar’s accession year, i.e., 

before the 17 tablets dated to months II-V of Evil-Merodach’s 2 nd and last year, seemingly 

creating an overlap of about four months between the two reigns. Normally, the two early 

dates would be viewed as anomalous. But Furuli evidently presupposes that the two dates 

are correct and counts the 17 following tablets as anomalous! 

Further, Furuli lists three tablets dated to months X, XI, and XII of Evil-Merodach’s 2 nd 

year, i. e., after the 37 tablets dated to months V-IX of Neriglissar. This would increase the 

overlap between the two reigns to more than ten months, from Neriglissar’s accession in 

month I to Evil-Merodach’s last tablet dated early in month XII. Instead of regarding the 

three tablets as anomalous, Furuli counts the preceding 37 tablets from the accession year of 

Neriglissar as anomalous! 

Finally, Furuli lists in his table four other tablets that also seem to support an overlap 

between the two reigns. Two of them are placed early in month V of Neriglissar’s reign and 

two others in month VII of Evil-Merodach’s reign. According to Furuli’s way of reckoning, 

the two latter tablets would increase the number of anomalous tablets from the last months 

of Evil-Merodach’s last year of reign from 17 to 19. On the number of anomalous tablets 

from the accession year of Neriglissar Furuli states that there are “at least 41 tablets dated in 

the accession year of Neriglissar before the last tablet dated to Evil-Merodach.” (Furuli, p. 

60) If these 41 tablets and also the previous 19 tablets are all counted as anomalous, we 

would get 60 “anomalous tablets” during the Evil-Merodach/Neriglissar overlap! 

Thus, out of nine tablets with seemingly odd dates Furuli succeeds in creating 60 tablets 

with “anomalous dates”! 

Let us take a closer look at the nine tablets that really seem to be oddly dated. They are: 

Neriglissar: 


Tablet no.: 

(1) I/26/acc. AOAT 236, 97 

(2) II/04/acc. BM 75489 

(3) V/?/acc. BM 60150 

(4) V/06/acc. BM 30419 

Evil-Merodach: 

Month/day/year: Tablet no. : 

(5) VII/08/02 BM 58580 

(6) VII/08/02 BM 75106 

(7) X/17/02 BM 61325 

(8) XI/15/02 ? 

(9) XII/02/03 BM 58580 

It does not seem that Furuli has himself collated any of these tablets or has had them 

collated by experienced specialists on cuneiform. Had he done this, he would have 

discovered that most of the “odd dates” disappear.


Tablet no. 1 is published as no. 97 in a work by Ronald H. Sack in his work, Neriglissar – 

King of Babylon (Neukirchen-Vluyn, 1994). This is Band 236 in the series Alter Orient und Altes 

Testament, which explains the reference to the tablet as AOAT 236, 97. The museum number 

is BM 60231. Sack’s transliteration and translation of the tablet on page 235 reveals that the 

month sign is damaged. Sack, therefore, adds a question mark after the month name and 

puts it within half brackets: ⌐Nisanu(?)¬. Although Sack in a table on pages 59-61 gives the 

year, month, and day of the tablet as Acc/I/26, he leaves out the month altogether in his 

“Catalogue and Description of Datable Texts” on pages 49-54, giving the year/month/day 

as “Acc. … 25”. (Sack, p. 54) 

To get to know just how damaged the month name on the tablet is, I sent an email to Dr. 

Jon Taylor, Curator at the Department of the Middle East at the British Museum, and asked 

him to check the date. In an email received on June 24, 2008, he explained: 

“I've had a look at that tablet, and also shown it to several people with more 

experience in Neo-Babylonian texts than I have. The sign in question is not 

just damaged but also right on the corner of the tablet, and thus probably 

distorted. The more you look at it, the more signs it could be. None of us 

has been able to decide with certainty what it really is. I can send you a 

photo if you would like to see for yourself.” 

Obviously, it cannot be claimed that the date on this tablet really is anomalous. 

Tablet no. 2, BM 75489, is published as no. 91 in Sack’s work on Neriglissar. The tablet is 

clearly dated to month II, day 4, of Neriglissar’s accession year. This was confirmed by C. B. 

F. Walker, who collated the tablet several times, once together with two other 

Assyriologists, Dr. G. van Driel and Mr Bongenaar, on November 9, 1990. (Walker, 

“Corrections,” 1996, p. 7; cf. GTR4, p. 326, n. 33.) The date of this tablet, then, is clearly 

anomalous. Whether it is correct or a scribal error is, of course, another question. 

Tablet no. 3, BM 60150, is dated to month V, but the day number is damaged and illegible. 

As the transition between Evil-Merodach and Neriglissar took place between day 17 and day 

21 in the same month (month V), it cannot be shown that this tablet is dated earlier, and it 

would be wrong to claim that its date is anomalous. 

Tablet no. 4, BM 30419, is dated by Furuli to month V, day 6, of Neriglissar’s accession 

year. This is also the date given by R. H. Sack in his book on Neriglissar (published as text 

no. 12, pp. 150, 151.) However, “month V (ITI.NE)” seems to be a modern misreading. 

The tablet was examined in 1990 by C. B. F. Walker together with another Assyriologist, Dr. 

van Driel. Walker explains that, “Only the beginning of the month name is preserved, but 

we both agree that ITI.N[E] seems to be out of the question and that ITI.Z[IZ], month XI, 

may be the best guess at the moment.” (Letter Walker-Jonsson, November 13, 1990, p. 2) 

Again, the tablet cannot be shown to be anomalous. 

Tablet no. 5 and 9, BM 58580, is listed twice in Furuli’s table, but with two different dates: 

VII/08/02 and XII/02/03. Both dates are wrong. Professor D. J. Wiseman, who collated 

the tablet in 1987, wrote: “Not year 3 possibly 2/2/2” (day 2, month 2, Year 2). (Letter 

Wiseman-Jonsson, October 7, 1987) C. B. F. Walker, in “Corrections,” 1996, p. 3, confirms 

Wiseman’s reading “2/2/2”. The tablet, then, is not anomalous. 

Tablet no. 6, BM 75106, dated VII/08/02 in Furuli’s table, is actually dated to month IV, 

according to C. B. F. Walker’s “Corrections,” 1996, p. 7. The date creates no problem. 

Tablet no. 7, BM 61325, was collated by C. B. F. Walker, Dr. van Driel and Mr. Bongenaar 

on November 9, 1990. Walker says that, “The month is slightly damaged, but seems to be 

clearly ITI.AB (month X) rather than ITI.NE (month V). Not day 17 as previously stated.” 

The day number is 19. The date on this tablet, then, is X/19/02. This does not necessarily 

mean that it is correct. It may be a scribal error. 

Tablet no. 8, finally, is dated to XI/15/02 in Furuli’s table. Furuli points out in a note (p. 62, 

n. 79) that the inventory number is missing, so he was unable to identify it. He refers,


however, to W. St. Chad Boscawen’s table on page 52 of the Transactions of the Society of 

Biblical Archaeology, Vol. VI (London, January, 1878). The date there has day 5, not day 15 as 

in Furuli’s tablet. 

Actually, a copy of this tablet by B. T. A. Evetts was published four years later as no. 66 in 

his Babylonische Texte (Leipzig, 1892). As shown on page 3 of the same work, Evetts read 

both the year number and the royal name differently: He dates it to XI/05/03 of 

Neriglissar, not of Evil-Merodach! A transliteration and translation of the same tablet by 

Ronald H. Sack has also been included in his recent work on Neriglissar – King of Babylon (= 

AOAT, Band 236. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1994), pp. 205-206. The 

museum number is BM 30577. Sack, who collated the tablet afresh, confirms the reading of 

Evetts. Obviously, Boscawen had misread the tablet. Its date creates no problems. 

In the discussion above, the 60 supposedly “anomalous tablets” dated to the transition 

from Evil-Merodach to Neriglissar presented in Furuli’s “Table 3.4” were first reduced to 

nine tablets that seemed to conflict with conventional chronology. Of these tablets only two 

could be demonstrated to have clear anomalous dates, i.e., no. 2 (BM 75489), dated to 

Neriglissar, II/04/acc. and no. 7 (BM 61325), dated to Evil-Merodach, X/19/02. This result 

is the same as that reached in GTR4 (pp. 325-327). How are the two tablets to be explained? 

Do they, as Furuli claims on page 60, “strongly suggest that the accession year of Neriglissar 

is not the same year as the second year of Evil-Merodach, but one or more years must have 

elapsed between their reigns”? This is certainly not the correct conclusion to draw, as this 

would contradict many other documents from the period, including the astronomical 

tablets. 

It should be noticed that the dates on these two tablets stand isolated from the other dates 

in the transition between the two reigns. The tablet dated in month II of Neriglissar’s 

accession year is not followed by any tablets dated to his reign in the next two months, III 

and IV, while we have several tablets dated in every month of his accession year from 

month V and onward. Similarly, we have several published and unpublished tablets dated in 

every month of Evil-Merodach’s reign up to month V of his 2 nd year, while the tablet from 

month X of his 2 nd year is an isolated date that appears five months later. Normally, we 

should have several tablets from each of the four months between V and X dated to his 

reign, but we have none. What does this indicate? 

Dr. G. van Driel, in his discussion of the first of the two tablets (AOAT 236, 91 = BM 

75489), says: 

“The Sippar text R. H. Sack, Neriglissar no. 91, dated to 4 II accession year, 

would suggest a considerable overlap with the preceding king Awil-Marduk, 

to whom later Sippar texts (listed by Sack, p. 26, n. 19) are dated. A mistake in 

the date of AOAT 236, no. 91 is the easiest solution. It should be noted that the 

Uruk kinglist (J. J. A. van Dijk, UVB 18 [1962] pp. 53-60 obv. 9) gives N. 3 

years and 8 months, which could exceptionally refer to the actual reign and 

not to a reign starting with the beginning of the first full year.” – G. van 

Driel in Reallexikon der Assyriologie und Vorderasiatischen Archäologie, Band 9 

(Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1998-2001), p. 228. Emphasis added. 

(Cf. the similar comments in GTR4, pp. 326, 327. In note 35 on p. 327 an 

alternative solution is also discussed.) 

The easiest and most natural explanation, then, is that the two odd dates are scribal errors. 

As Furuli himself admits in his first volume on chronology, “one or two contradictory finds 

do not necessarily destroy a chronology that has been substantiated by hundreds of 

independent finds.” (Rolf Furuli, Persian Chronology and the Length of the Babylonian Exile of the 

Jews, Oslo, 2003, p. 22) This is certainly true of the two anomalous tablets discussed above.


(5) Neriglissar to Labashi-Marduk 

In Table 3.5 on page 62 of his book Furuli presents ten tablets which he claims overlap the 

end of the reign of Neriglissar with the reigns of the last two kings of in the Neo- 

Babylonian period, his son Labashi-Marduk and Nabonidus. The dates on the four last 

tablets from the 4 th regnal year of Neriglissar listed in the table are: 

Month/day/year: Tablet no.: 

I/02/04 BM 41401 

I?/06/04 YBC 3433 

II/02/04 BM 30334 

II/01/04 ? 

The earliest two tablets from the reign of Neriglissar’s successor Labashi-Marduk are dated 

I/11+/acc. (Pinches 55, 432 = BM 58432) and I/23/acc. (NBC 4534), which seems to be a 

few weeks earlier than the two latest tablets from the reign of Neriglissar in the table above, 

BM 30334 and “?”. Furuli says: 

“The first tablet from the reign of Labashi-Merodach is dated to day 11+ of 

month I of his accession year, but this cannot be harmonized with the tablet 

dated to month II of year 4 of Neriglissar.” 

The date of BM 30334 in Furuli’s table, however, is wrong. A copy of the tablet by B. T. A. 

Evetts was first published as no. 69 in Babylonische Texte (1892). In a table on page 3 he 

shows the date to be I/02/04. The date on the tablet was collated and confirmed by Ronald 

H. Sack, whose transliteration and translation of the tablet appears on page 208 of his work 

on Neriglissar – King of Babylon (1994). The date creates no overlap between the two reigns. 

Unfortunately, the last tablet in Furuli’s table on Neriglissar, dated II/01/04, has no 

number. As Furuli admits on page 63 he has been unable to identify the tablet and verify the 

date. He has found the date in an old article by F. H. Weissbach published in Zeitschrift der 

Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft, Band 62, 1908, page 630. But Weissbach gives no 

further reference. The date has probably turned out to be wrong. It was not included by R. 

A. Parker and W. H. Dubberstein in their Babylonian Chronology 626 B.C. – A.D. 75 (1956), 

nor has it been referred to in later articles on Neriglissar or in R. H. Sack’s work on this 

regent. The date has to be rejected until Furuli can prove its correctness. The conclusion on 

page 327 of my book (GTR4), therefore, still stands: 

“The last two tablets known from the reign of Neriglissar are dated I/2/4 

(April 12, 556 B.C.E.) and I?/6/4 (April 16). The first tablet known from the 

reign of his son and successor, Labashi-Marduk, is dated I/23/acc. (May 3, 

556 B.C.E.), that is, twenty-one, or possibly only seventeen days later. These 

dates create no overlap between the two.” 

(6) Labashi-Marduk to Nabonidus 

According to Furuli’s Table 3.5, the latest tablet from the reign of Labashi-Marduk is dated 

III/12/acc., while the earliest tablet from the reign of his successor Nabonidus is dated in 

the previous month, on II/15/acc.: 

The two latest tablets from the reign of Labashi-Marduk: 

Month/day/year: Tablet no.: 

III/11/acc. (= June 19) YBC 3817 

III/12/acc. (= June 20) Evetts, Lab. No. 1 (PD p. 13)


The two earliest tablets from the reign of Nabonidus: 


Tablet no.: 

II/15/acc. (= May 25) Clay 1908, 39 (= BE VIII, 39) 

III/18/acc. (= June 26) Strassm. 1889, 1 (= Nbn 1) 

At first glance these tablets seem to show an overlap of 26 days between the two reigns. But 

a closer examination of the texts shows that this is not the case if the provenance of the tablets is 

taken into consideration. 

The Uruk king list credits Labashi-Marduk with a reign of only three months, which is 

confirmed by the contemporary contract tablets, which are dated only to (parts of) months 

I, II, and III. According to Berossus he was plotted against and killed because of his wicked 

behaviour. The rebellion broke out almost immediately after his accession, evidently before 

he had gained control over the whole kingdom. This conclusion is supported by the fact 

that the tablets dated to his reign come from only four places: Babylon, Uruk, Sippar, and 

(one tablet) Borsippa. 

The earliest tablet dated to Nabonidus is from Nippur. No tablets dated to Labashi-Marduk 

are from that city. And the latest tablets dated to him from Babylon, Uruk, Sippar, and 

Borsippa are all earlier than the earliest tablets from these cities dated to Nabonidus. Thus 

there are no overlaps between the two kings at any of these places. Professor Wolfgang 

Röllig concludes: 

“Both, then, have ruled, or laid claim to the throne, at the same time, although 

at different places.” – W. Röllig in Reallexikon der Assyriologie und vorderasiatischen 

Archäologie, Band 6 (Berlin and New York, 1980), p. 409. Emphasis added. 

(Cf. also GTR4, pp. 327, 328) 

This is shown in the following table: 

Nippur Babylon Uruk Sippar Borsippa 

Labashi- 

Marduk, 

latest 

tablets 

--- 

II/22/acc. 

(= June 1) 

III/11/acc. 

(= June 19) 

III/12/acc. 

(= June 20) 

II/26/acc. 

(= June 5) 

Nabonidus, 

earliest 

tablets 

II/15/acc. 

(= May 25) 

IV/06/acc. 

(July 14?) 

III/23/acc. 

(= July 1) 

III/18/acc.* 

(= June 26) 

VII/27/acc. 

(= Oct. 31) 

* PD p. 13 mentions a text, VAS VI 65, dated to III/01/acc. (June 9, 556) of Nabonidus. 

Although Sippar is not mentioned in the text, the inscription is reported to have been found 

there. It is a building inscription. Although it bears no date, F. X. Kugler (Sternkunde und 

Sterndienst in Babel, II:II:2, 1924, pp. 405-408) argued that it describes restoration work done 

in Sippar from day 1, month III of Nabonidus’ accession year onward. This view is rejected 

by P.-A- Beaulieu, whose careful study shows that restoration works took place in Sippar “in 

the second, the tenth, and the sixteenth year of Nabonidus”, but not in his accession year. 

(Beaulieu, The Reign of Nabonidus, King of Babylon 556-539 B.C., New Haven and London: Yale 

University Press, 1989, p. 6. Cf. his Table 2 on p. 42.) 

Furuli’s claim (p. 63), that “we can hardly avoid the conclusion that there was one or more 

years between Neriglissar and Nabonaid,” has no factual foundation. The supposed overlap 

between Neriglissar and Labashi-Marduk is based on misreading of tablets, and the Labashi- 

Marduk/Nabonidus “overlap,” which disappears on local level, is easily explained by the 

political circumstances that brought Nabonidus to the throne.


(7) Nabonidus to Cyrus 

According to the Nabonidus Chronicle (translated by A. K. Grayson as Chronicle 7 in his 

Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles, Locust Valley, New York: J.J. Augustin Publisher, 1975, pp. 

104-111), Babylon was captured by the army of Cyrus on the 16 th day of Tishri (= month 

VII), evidently in the 17 th regnal year of Nabonidus (= October 11/12, 539 BCE; the year is 

damaged and illegible). This date, then, marked the end of the reign of Nabonidus. Cyrus 

himself entered Babylon on the 3 rd day of month VIII, Arahsamnu (= October 28/29). The 

earliest tablet extant from the reign of Cyrus (CT 57:717) is dated to day 19, month VII 

(Tishri) of his accession-year, i.e., three days after the fall of Babylon. 

Furuli, however, tries to argue that Nabonidus may have ruled longer than 17 years. He 

claims that, “Some anomalous tablets w[h]ere the reigns overlap do exist, but the dates of 

two [of] these tablets are explained away ad hoc by P&D, as the footnotes show.” (Furuli, p. 

63) As will be demonstrated below this accusation is false. 

In Table 3.6 on pages 63 and 64 he presents four tablets that he claims are dated to 

Nabonidus after the fall of Babylon on VII/16/17: 


Tablet no.: 

VII/10/17 Strassm. Nab 1054 

IX/xx/17 Strassm. Nab 1055 

XII/17/17 CT 57.168 

VI/06/18 Contenau 1927, 122 

The first date contains a typing error and should be VIII/10/17. Actually, it has been 

known since 1990 that none of these four tablets have anomalous dates, and it is quite 

remarkable that Furuli does not know this. All dates are discussed, for example, in my book. 

All I can do, therefore, is to repeat the information presented in GTR4 on pages 356-358 

and in note 62 on page 120: 

“VIII/10/17” (Strassm. Nab 1054 =BM 74972): 

As Furuli explains in note 84, PD rejected this date because “the month sign is shaded” in J. 

N. Strassmaier’s copy of the text published in 1889. (PD = Parker & Dubberstein, Babylonian 

Chronology, 1956, p. 13; the tablet is listed as no. 1054 in J. Strassmaier, Inschriften von 

Nabonidus, König von Babylon, Leipzig, 1889) They had good reasons for doing this because F. 

H. Weissbach, who collated the tablet in 1908, explained that the month name was highly 

uncertain and “in any case not Arahsamnu” (month VIII). 

Actually, there is an even more serious error with the date. Back in 1990 I asked C. B. F. 

Walker at the British Museum to take another look at the date on the original tablet. He did 

this together with two other Assyriologists. They all agreed that the year is 16, not 17. 

Walker says: 

“On the Nabonidus text no. 1054 mentioned by Parker and Dubberstein p. 

13 and Kugler, SSB II 388, I have collated that tablet (BM 74972) and am 

satisfied that the year is 16, not 17. It has also been checked by Dr. G. Van 

Driel and Mr. Bongenaar, and they both agree with me.” – Letter Walker to 

Jonsson, 13 November 1990. 

“IX/xx/17” (Strassm. Nab 1055): 

This text does not give any day number, the date above just being given as “Kislimu [= 

month IX], year 17 of Nabonidus”. The text, in fact, contains four different dates of this 

kind, in the following chronological disorder: Months IX, I, XII, and VI of “year 17 of 

Nabonidus”. None of these dates refers to the time when the tablet was drawn up. Such a 

date is actually missing on the tablet. As F. X. Kugler explained, the tablet belongs to a


category of texts containing instalment dates or delivery dates (maššartum). (F. X. Kugler, 

Sternkunde und Sterndienst in Babel, Vol. II:2, 1912, pp. 388, 389) Such dates were given at 

least one month, and often several months in advance. That is why Parker & Dubberstein 

explain that “this tablet is useless for dating purposes.” (Parker & Dubberstein, Babylonian 

Chronology, p. 14) As shown by its contents, No. 1055 is an administrative text giving the 

dates for deliveries of certain amounts of barley in year 17 of Nabonidus. - P.- A. Beaulieu in 

the Journal of Near Eastern Studies, Vol. 52:4 (1993), pp. 256, 258. 

“XII/17 /17” (CT 57.168 = BM 55694): 

This tablet was copied by T. G. Pinches in the 1890’s and was finally published in 1982 as 

CT 57:168. (CT 57:168 = Cuneiform Texts from Babylonian Tablets in the British Museum, Part. 57, 

1982, No. 168) It is also listed in CBT 6 where the date is given as “Nb(-) 19/12/13+” (= 

day 19, month 12, year 13+). (Erle Leichty, ed., Catalogue of the Babylonian Tablets in the British 

Museum [CBT], Vol. 6, 1986, p. 184 [82-7-14, 51]) Both the royal name and the year number 

are obviously damaged and only partially legible. “Nb(-)” shows that the royal name begins 

with “Nabu-”. This could refer either to Nabopolassar, Nebuchadnezzar, or Nabonidus. If 

it is Nabonidus, the damaged year number, “13+”, may refer to any year between his 13 th 

and 17 th year. 

“VI/06/18” (Contenau 1927, 122): 

This tablet was copied by G. Contenau and was published as number 121 (“122” in Furuli’s 

table is an error) in his work Textes Cuneiformes, Tome XII, Contrats Néo-Babyloniens, I (Paris: 

Librarie Orientaliste, 1927), Pl. LVIII. Line 1 gives the date as “VI/06/17,” but when it is 

repeated in line 19 in the text it is given as “VI/6/18.” PD (Parker & Dubberstein, p. 13) 

assumed “either a scribal error or an error by Contenau.” The matter was settled by Dr. 

Béatrice André, who at my request collated the original at the Louvre Museum in Paris in 

1990: “The last line has, like the first, the year 17, and the error comes from Contenau.” — 

Letter André-Jonsson, March 20, 1990. (See GTR4, p. 120, n. 62) 

One could also mention another, similar error on page 117 in the latest CBT catalogue (M. 

Sigrist, R. Zadok, and C. B. F. Walker [eds.], Catalogue of the Babylonian Tablets in the British 

Museum, Vol. III, London: The British Museum Press, 2006), where text 486 (= BM 26668) 

is dated “Nbn 18/III/18” (= day 18, month III, year 18). On my request Dr. Jonathan 

Taylor, who is Curator at the Department of the Middle East at the British Museum, 

collated the tablet. In an email dated January 15, 2008, he explained: 

“A year 18 for Nabonidus would indeed be very interesting. Unfortunately, 

the 18 is a typo here and the tablet is datable simply to year 8.” 

None of the four tablets listed by Furuli have an anomalous date. None of them, therefore, 

may “suggest either that there was one or more years between Nabonaid and Cyrus, or that 

the regnal years of Nabonaid could be calculated in a way different from the expected one.” 

(Furuli, p. 63) 

Summary 

If a scholar believes it is possible to present a radical revision of the generally accepted 

chronology of an ancient, well known historical period, he/she should be able to present 

strong evidence of this, and he/she has to be very careful to check if his/her evidence is 

valid before it is published. Furuli has done nothing of this. His claim that there are “about 

90 anomalous tablets” from the Neo-Babylonian period is demonstrably false. And most of 

the “anomalous dates” that he does quote have been proved not to be anomalous at all. 

Fresh collations have shown that most of them either contain scribal errors or have been 

misread by modern scholars, or have turned out to be modern copying, transcription, or 

printing errors. 

The question is why Furuli has used such tablets in support of his “Oslo chronology” 

without having them collated. Basing a radical revision of the chronology established for


one of the chronologically best established periods in antiquity on misreadings and 

misinterpretations of the documents used does not speak very well about the quality of the 

research performed. 

Part IV: The Neo-Babylonian Ledger NBC 4897 

The cuneiform tablet NBC 4897 is a ledger, tabulating the annual growth of a herd of sheep 

and goats belonging to the Eanna temple at Uruk for ten consecutive years, from the thirtyseventh 

year of Nebuchadnezzar to the first year of Neriglissar. As it is an annual record, it 

clearly shows that Nebuchadnezzar ruled for 43 years, his son Amēl-Marduk for 2 years, and 

that the latter was succeeded by Neriglissar. The tablet makes it impossible to insert any 

extra years or any extra kings between Nebuchadnezzar and Amēl-Marduk, or between 

Amēl-Marduk and Neriglissar. This is strong evidence, indeed. 

The first presentation and discussion of the tablet was included in an article written by 

Ronald H. Sack, “Some Notes on Bookkeeping in Eanna,” published in M. A. Powell Jr. 

and R. H. Sack (eds.), Studies in Honor of Tom B. Jones (1979). It was a brief, preliminary study 

of just five normal-sized pages (pp. 114 -118), three of which contain a drawing of the 

tablet. 

Another discussion of the tablet appeared 16 years later in an article written by G. van Driel 

& K. R. Nemet-Nejat, “Bookkeeping Practices for an Institutional Herd at Eanna,” Journal of 

Cuneiform Studies, Vol. 46 (1994), pp. 47-58. It was a somewhat longer study of 12 large-sized 

pages, six of which contain a drawing, transliteration and translation of the tablet. Their 

article corrects a number of errors and misinterpretations by Sack. 

The most extensive and detailed discussion of the tablet, however, is Stefan Zawadzki’s 

article, “Bookkeeping Practices at the Eanna Temple in Uruk in the Light of the Text NBC 

4897,” Journal of Cuneiform Studies, Vol. 55 (2003), pp. 99-123. Zawadzki’s discussion covers 

25 large-sized pages, four of which give a transliteration and translation of the tablet. The 

article contains the most detailed and careful examination of the tablet so far. He corrects a 

number of misreadings and misinterpretations in the previous articles by Ronald H. Sack 

and G. van Driel/K. R. Nemet-Nejat. 

Do the total numbers on the tablet contain serious mistakes and 

miscalculations? 

Although van Driel and Nemet-Nejat corrected many misinterpretations and misreadings by 

Sack, they also claimed that the interpretation of the tablet “is hampered by miscalculations 

and mistakes in the text.” (Van Driel/Nemet-Nejat, p. 47) Their conclusion at the end of 

their article (page 57) is quoted approvingly by Rolf Furuli, who claims that it “highlights the 

lack of quality of this tablet”: 

“For the most part, mistakes occur in the totals. The scribes probably had 

difficulties similar to ours in reading the numbers in their ledgers. We can 

understand small mistakes of a single digit, but the mistakes occurring in the 

crucial final section of NBC 4897 again raise the question of how the 

administrations could work with this kind of accounting.” – Quoted by Rolf 

Furuli in his Assyrian, Babylonian, and Egyptian Chronology, pp. 247, 248 (2007 

ed.; pp. 251, 252 in the 2 nd ed. of 2008). 

As is demonstrated by Zawadzki, however, these claims are much exaggerated. The fact is 

that they are mainly based on misreadings and misunderstandings by the authors. As 

Zawadzki explains, van Driel “has solved many problems, yet he has failed to explain several 

significant points, or has proposed interpretations that require reevaluation.” (Zawadzki, p. 100; 

emphasis added) In fact, when the tablet is correctly read, copied, understood and 

translated, it can be shown to contain very few errors “in the totals”, and these are small and 

unessential and do not occur “in the crucial final section of NBC 4897” as van Driel/Nemet- 

Nejat state.


Concerning the claim that the mistakes for the most part “occur in the totals”, the most 

serious of these according to van Driel/Nemet-Nejat’s translation are found in lines 31 and 

35, where the numbers of sheep (rams + ewes + male lambs + young ewes) are summarized 

as follows: 

Line 31: 170 + 390 + 66 + 193 = total: 759. 

Line 35: 5 + 198 + 14 + 51 = total: 198. 

As van Driel/Nemet-Nejat observed (pp. 53, 57), the numbers they have read in line 31 add 

up to 819, not 759, and those in line 35 add up to 268, not 198. 

With respect to line 31, however, Zawadzki notes that, “Van Driel reads mistakenly 193 

lambs while the copy gives clearly 133. The horizontal total of 759 is correct. Thus his 

calculations in JCS 46, [page] 57 from point (3) to the end of the article [i.e., the whole last 

page of the article] are wrong.” (Zawadzki, p. 104, note 23) 

Line 35 contains two further misreadings: The number 198 is a misreading for 138 

(Zawadzki, p. 104, n. 25) and number 51 is a misreading for 41. Paul-Alain Beaulieu, who 

collated the original tablet at Yale, comments, “The tablet has a clear 41, indeed, but the 

scribe has written 51 and then erased one of the Winkelhaken to make 41.” (Zawadzki, p. 

104, n. 26) The horizontal total of 198 in line 35, therefore, is also correct. 

Thus there are no errors “in the crucial final section” of the tablets. When the individual 

figures have been correctly read, copied and translated, and the procedure used by the 

accountant to arrive at the “totals” and the “Grand totals” is correctly understood, the 

calculations of the accountant turn out to be surprisingly free from serious errors. At only 

two places the “Grand totals” contains errors, and these are very small. For the 37 th year 

(line 5) the “Grand total” shows 176 animals instead of 174, and for the 40 th year (line 14) it 

shows 303 animals instead of 306. For all the other eight years the calculations are correct! 

In view of this, it is remarkable that Rolf Furuli in his attempt to undermine the 

chronological impact of NBC 4897 has devoted so little attention to Zawadzki’s careful 

analysis of the ledger that he has failed to notice that his quotation from van Driel/Nemet- 

Nejat about the supposed numerical mistakes on the tablet has been refuted by Zawadzki! 

Table 1 below, which is based on Zawadzki’s study, summarizes the calculations in the 

ledger, demonstrating that the Neo-Babylonian accountant usually did an excellent job and 

that the few mistakes he did in his calculations of the annual increase of the herd were of 

very small consequence. In the table “BF” means “brought forward” and “CF” means 

“carried forward.” “Nbk” means Nebuchadnezzar, “AmM” Amēl-Marduk, and “Ngl” 

Neriglissar. The regnal year numbers in the first column includes some emendations or 

reconstructions by van Driel and Zawadzki. (Zawadzki, page 100, note 9) See further Table 

2 below.


Table 1: A summary of the calculations in the ledger NBC 4897 

Regnal 

year: 

BF from 

previous 

year: 

- 

Animals 

paid for 

shearing: 

- Hides 

(of dead 

animals) 

: 

- 

Wages 

(= 

animals 

) to 

shepher 

d(s): 

+ Lambs 

(male and 

female): 

+ Kids 

(male 

and 

female): 

Gran 

d 

total 

(CF) 

on 

tablet 

: 

Actual 

Grand 

total: 

37th 

Nbk 

137 - 12 - 4 16 + 36 0 + 1 176 174 ! 

38th 176 - 2 - 15 - 5 18 + 40 1 + 1 214 214 

39th 214 - 4 - 19 - 7 23 + 45 1 + 2 255 255 

40th 255 - 2 - 22 - 8 27 + 53 1 + 2 303 306 ! 

41st 303 - 7 (6+1) - 27 - 10 31 + 60 2 + 2 354 354 

42nd 354 - 2 (1+1) - 32 - 11 40 + 65 2 + 2 418 418 

43rd 418 - 7 - 37 - 13 41 + 80 2 + 3 487 487 

1st 

AmM 

0 

AmM 

487 - 7 - 43 - 15 48 + 90 3 + 3 566 566 

104 104 

1st 

AmM 

566 + 

104 

- 5 665 665 

2nd 665 - 0 - 61 - 22 66 + 133 4 + 4 789 789 

1st Ngl 789 - 5 - 71 - 26 80 + 146 4 + 5 922 922 

Seen 208 208 

Not seen 922 - 

208 

- 11 

(8+3) 

703 703 

Note: The last three lines in the table summarize lines 34–36 of the tablet. In the 1 st year 

of Neriglissar the herd had increased to 922 animals according to line 34. Of these, 208 

animals “were seen” according to line 35. As Zawadzki explains, this means that this was 

“the part of the herd, which was actually brought to the inspection in Uruk”. As line 34 

goes on to state that “8 lambs were received in Uruk, 3 lambs (were given) for shearing”, the 

number of animals that “were not seen” was 703 (922 – 208 – 8 – 3) as line 36 of the tablet 

shows. 

Does the tablet indicate another king between Nebuchadnezzar and 

Amēl-Marduk? 

Lines 26, 27, and 28 of the tablet are dated to year 1, accession year, and year 1, respectively, 

of Amēl-Marduk. At first glance this order seems strange. Furuli utilizes it for arguing that, 

“If the name [in line 27] is Evil-Merodach, the king in line 26 is probably another king, 

because the accession year of a king is mentioned in line 27, and the first year of a king is 

mentioned in line 26. And naturally, the accession year of a king will be mentioned before 

his first year.” (Furuli, p. 253) 

Furuli has a tendency to “muddy the waters” by giving examples of how one and the same 

cuneiform sign can be interpreted in many different ways. This is the method he resorts to 

here. He claims that the signs translated Amēl-Marduk (Evil-Merodach) in line 26 can also 

be read in many other ways. On pages 252-253 he gives a list of “24 different names, each


of which the signs can represent, depending on how each sign is read.” One of these names 

is Nadin-Ninurta, which according to Furuli may have been an unknown king who “reigned 

before Neriglissar.” (Furuli, p. 78) 

But is a combination of a few signs really that problematic? Erica Reiner, who was a leading 

specialist on cuneiform and Akkadian (she died in 2005), explains: 

“In spite of the polyvalence of the cuneiform syllabary, there is normally 

only one correct reading for each group of signs, whether the unit be a word 

or a phrase; in those cases where there is actual ambiguity, it cannot be 

solved from internal evidence alone, just as ambiguous constructions in any 

language, including English. To take an example, if sign A has as possible 

values the syllables ur, liK, DaŠ, and sign B the syllables kur, laD, maD, naD, 

ŠaD, (K stands for an element of the set whose elements are {g, k, q}, abbr. 

K Є {g, k, q}, similarly Š Є {z, s, ş, š}, D Є {d, t, >}), the combination 

AAB, representing one word, will be read, of all possible 16.16.22 = 2 9 .11 = 

512.11 = 5632 combinations, uniquely and unequivocally as lik-taš-šad, 

because of these 5632 combinations 5631 will be eliminated on graphemical, 

phonological, and lexical grounds.” – Erica Reiner, “Akkadian,” in Lingustics 

in South West Asian and North Africa (ed. T. A. Sebeok; Current Trends in 

Linguistics 6; The Hague: Mouton, 1970), p. 293. 

The signs for the royal name in line 26 are read as LÚ- d ŠÚ by Sack, van Driel/Nemet-Nejat, 

and Zawadzki. Furuli (p. 252) agrees that this is “a reasonable interpretation” of the signs, 

although he indicates that the signs are only partially legible and that other readings, 

therefore, are also possible, giving a number of examples of this. The name “Nadin- 

Ninurta”, for example, would require that the signs can be read MU- d MAŠ instead of LÚdŠÚ. 

To get to know if the signs are really so difficult to read I sent a question about the 

matter to Elizabeth Payne, an experienced Assyriologist at the Yale University which holds 

the tablet. Payne, who is also a specialist on the Eanna archive (to which NBC 4897 

belongs), answered: 

“This section of the text is not at all damaged. As indicated by Nemet- 

Nejat’s copy (JCS 46, 48) the signs are well preserved and alternate readings 

would require altering the text… I think Nadin-Ninurta can be safely 

excluded.” (Email received on November 14, 2008) 

As the reading LÚ- d ŠÚ, then, is clear, the only reasonable translation is “Am ēl -Marduk”. 

None of the other 23 alternative readings listed by Furuli is possible. Interestingly, Furuli’s 

list does not include “the only really possible alternative reading of LÚ- d ŠÚ, which is Amilili-shú, 

‘man of his (personal) god’, a name well attested, but in Old Babylonian times. Since 

no Neo-Babylonian king by the name of Amil-ilishu is known, and there is a king Amil- 

Marduk, it is exceedingly unlikely that Amil-ilishu should be read here.” (Email from 

Professor Hermann Hunger dated November 11, 2008) 

Apart from these linguistic considerations, a simple and natural explanation of the seemingly 

peculiar order of regnal years is clearly indicated by the context. 

What Furuli has not realized is that the addition of 104 animals in line 27 does not refer to 

another year’s increase of animals due to breeding within the herd. It should be noticed that 

figures of animals paid for shearing, hides of dead animals, and wages paid, which are given 

for every year, are missing here. Instead, the reason for the adding of this number is stated 

to be that it represents “income [irbu] from the month of Addaru [month XII], the accession 

year of Amēl-Marduk.” This is the only place in the text where the word irbu (“income”) is 

used. 

As suggested by Stefan Zawadzki, the most likely explanation for this extra augmentation of 

the flock stated to come from the end of the previous year (accession year of Amēl-Marduk) 

is that “the managers of the temple decided, for reasons unknown to us, to increase the herd 

by animals from other sources.” (Zawadzki, JCS 55, 2003, p. 103) These animals had to be


added to the herd at the next annual counting about a month or two later. The “Grand 

total” in the 1 st year of Amēl-Marduk, 566 animals, therefore, was increased by this added 

group of 104 animals and reduced by the 5 animals paid for the shearing of the flock. This 

increased the “Grand total” at the same occasion of counting to 665 animals as shown in 

the next line (line 28 on the tablet). 

This simple and natural explanation eliminates Furuli’s far-fetched and untenable 

explanations about “unknown kings” in this period. 

The readings of the regnal year numbers 

As is shown by the drawings of Sack and van Driel/Nemet-Nejat, some of the year 

numbers on the tablet are not easily identified and have been read differently by these 

scholars. This is true of the year numbers in lines 11, 14, 17, 20, 23, and 28. Therefore I 

wrote to the Yale University and asked if someone there could collate the year numbers 

afresh. This was done by Elizabeth Payne who, in addition to her observations, also 

attached a photo of the right half of the tablet. The results of her collations of the six lines 

mentioned above are shown in the fifth column in the table below. She finds that, “In each 

instance, the copy of van Driel/Nemet-Nejat is more reliable” than that of Sack. – Email 

Payne-Jonsson, dated October 29, 2008. 

The most reliable readings of the year numbers on the tablet are shown in column 6 of 

Table 2. The numbers shown for those read differently by Sack, van Driel/Nemet-Nejat, 

Zawadaki, and Furuli (those in lines 11, 14, 17, 20, 23, and 28) are based on Elisabeth 

Payne’s collations of the original tablet. The reasons for the selected readings of those lines 

are given below. 

Table 2: The readings of the year numbers on NBC 4897 

Line + king 

mentioned 

R. 

Sack 

Van 

Driel/Nemet- 

Nejat 

Rolf 

Furuli 

E. Payne’s 

corrections 

The best 

readings 

2 [Nbk] 1 37 37 30-7(?) 37 2 

5 37 37 37 37 2 

8 38 38 38 38 

11 29 38 ‘over erasure’ 29 38 38 (?) 

14 40 41 40 40 or 41 40 (?) 

17 31 41 42 41 41 

20 32 42 42 42 42 

23 -- 43 No year [4]3 43 

26 AmM 1 1 1 1 

27 AmM 0 0 0, 

Another 

0 

king? 

28 2 1 2 1! 1 

31 2 2 2 2 

34 Ngl 1 1 1 1 

37 Nbk–Ngl: 37 – 1 37 – 1 37 – 1 37 – 1


Note 1: Line 2 does not contain the name of Nebuchadnezzar. That regnal years 

37–43 refer to his reign is evident, however, because line 37 gives the following 

summary of the amount of goat hair acquired from shearing during all the ten years: 

“40 5/6 minas of goat hair from the 37 th year of Nabû-kudurri-usur, king of 

Babylon until the 1 st year of Nergal-šarra-usur, king of Babylon.” 

Note 2: Lines 2 and 5 are both dated to year 37. But as argued by van 

Driel/Nemet-Nejat, line 2 shows the balance brought forward from the previous 

year, i.e., the total number of sheep and goats (137) that had been entrusted the 

shepherd, “Nabû-ahhē-šullim, the descendant of Nabû-šum-iškun,” in year 36. 

Zawadzki (p. 100) agrees: 

“Van Driel’s discussion of the accountant’s method of reckoning is correct. 

The starting point of each subsequent account is the number of stock in the 

herd specified in the account for the previous year, from which the scribe 

subtracted … the dead animals (called KUŠ = mašku, ‘hides’), the animals 

given as wages (idî) and for shearing (referred to as ‘x animals ina gizzi’ in 

‘Grand total’).” 

To the remaining number were then added the lambs and kids born during the 

previous year, resulting in the new “Grand total” in line 5, “176” (actual total as 

shown in Table 1: 174) at the beginning of year 37. (Zawadzki, pp. 102, 103) The 

birthing and shearing took place around the turn of the year, “in the months Adaru- 

Aiaru”, i.e., from month XII to month II, which “provided the opportunity to count 

the stock” and pay the herdsmen “for the shearing after its completion.” (Zawadzki, 

p. 100, including note 7) 

The collations of Elisabeth Payne 

Line 11: Elisabeth Payne says that “the tablet reads MU.38.KAM [year 38], as copied.” 

Furuli claims (p. 248) that van Driel/Nemet-Nejat’s drawing “seems to be MU.28.KAM 2,” 

but he is wrong. A close look at the drawing shows three Winkelhaken, not just two, so they 

clearly read “38”, which agrees with the tablet as Payne points out. Sack reads “year 29”, 

which is adopted by Furuli, but this is wrong according to Payne. 

Actually, we would have expected “year 39” in this line. Instead, the tablet seems to name 

two successive years “year 38”, while year 39 is omitted. The total number of years remains 

the same, of course. Interestingly, van Driel/Nemet-Nejat (p. 48) note in the margin of their 

drawing that year number “38” is “written over erasure”, which might indicate that it is an 

error for “39”. On the other hand, as the annual shearing and counting took place around 

the turn of the year, it may have happened in some years that the shearing and counting 

took place twice, first early in the year as usual, and the next annual shearing and counting in 

the last month (Addaru) of the same year instead of early next year (39). This may very well 

have been the case here. 

Line 14: Sack’s drawing clearly shows “year 40” at this place, while van Driel/Nemet-Nejat 

read “year 41”. In their drawing, however, the sign for “1” is not a normal wedge, as the 

vertical line below the head is either too short or the wedge is turned diagonally upwards 

toward the left. This is also seen on the photo of the tablet received from Yale. Elisabeth 

Payne says: “The scribe clearly wrote MU.41.KAM, but there are traces of a possible 

erasure. It is unclear to me how this line should be read. Either is possible…” As the next 

year number in line 17 clearly is 41, the most logical conclusion is that “40” is the correct 

reading here. This, in fact, is also how Rolf Furuli reads the number. (Furuli, pp. 248, 249) 

Line 17: Sack has “year 31”, van Driel/Nemet-Nejat “year 41”, and Furuli “year 42”. Who is 

right? The original tablet, according to Payne, has 41: “Year 41 is correct”. Sack’s and 

Furuli’s numbers, therefore, are both wrong. 

Line 20: Sack has “year 32”, but Payne does not hesitate: “Year 42 is correct,” she says. Van 

Driel/Nemet-Nejat and Furuli agree.


Line 23: The year number is damaged, but it would logically be “43” as the next year is 

dated to the “1 st year of Amēl-Marduk,” the successor of Nebuchadnezzar. Van 

Driel/Nemet-Nejat have “43” in their transliteration and translation, but suggest a possible 

“42” on page 54. Actually, the last part of the number, “3,” is still legible. Payne explains: 

“This line is, indeed, badly damaged, but there are legible traces. Read: P[AB.M]A.ME {87 

MU.43.KAM} (erasure … ) The text continues after the erasure as read by vD/NN. The ‘3 

UDU’ they have in this line, however, is NOT there – it is the +3.KAM from the date.” 

Thus “43” is undoubtedly the correct restoration of the original number. 

Line 28: The year number on this line is read as “year 1” by van Driel, but Sack, followed by 

Furuli, reads “year 2”. Elizabeth Payne, who collated the line on November 14, 2008, 

explains: 

“I would read this section of the text as ‘mu.1!.kam’, as there are traces of a 

second ‘tail.’ It is, however, markedly different from line 31, where there are 

clearly two vertical wedges (mu.2.kam). In my opinion, the interpretation of 

vD [van Driel] and NN [Nemet-Nejat] is correct, but the copy omits these 

traces.” 

In conclusion, the tablet obviously gives an annual count of the herd, with no years missing. 

Furuli’s claim (p. 248) that “we cannot know that the tablet represents accounts of 

successive years” is nothing but wishful thinking. That the tablet gives annual reports is also 

confirmed by the calculations, as summarized in the Table 1 above. As the “Grand total” of 

the previous year is the same as the BF (balance brought forward) of the next year during 

the whole ten-year period, it is impossible to add any “unknown kings” or “extra years” to 

the period. The BF – CF totals tie each year directly to the next year without break. Any 

insertion of “extra years” or “unknown kings” would immediately destroy these obvious 

connections and require more annual increases. 

This is also confirmed by the annual increase of the herd. Furuli discusses this on page 257, 

but his calculation is invalid because he includes the 104 animals in line 27 in the annual 

increase of the herd, while in fact it was added from an external source as shown above. 

Zawadzki, on the other hand, who takes this into consideration, finds that “the average 

yearly growth of the herd (excluding the addition of new animals in AmM 1) was about 

18%.” (Zawadzki, pp. 104, 105) 

Thus the tablet NBC 4897 does show, clearly, that Nebuchadnezzar ruled for 43 years, and 

that his son and successor Amēl-Marduk ruled for 2 years and was succeeded by Neriglissar. 

Part V: Were there unknown Neo-Babylonian kings? 

[Note: The first edition of Rolf Furuli’s volume 2 was published in the autumn of 2007. 

Later in that year Part I of my critical review was published on this website. It was 

demonstrated that Furuli’s attempt (in chapter 6 and Appendix C) to redate the lunar 

observations recorded in the astronomical diary VAT 4956 was untenable. Evidently due to 

my criticism, Furuli rewrote parts of his discussion of VAT 4956 and quickly had a second 

revised edition of his book published in May, 2008. He even reclaimed copies of the first 

edition he had sent out about that time, telling the recipients that he would send them a 

copy of the new edition. 

An examination of Furuli’s revisions, however, shows them to be just another failed 

attempt to get rid of the historical reality as attested by VAT 4956. Very few changes were 

made in the rest of the book. Thus chapter 4 that is discussed in this part of my review is 

the same in both editions, the only difference being that chapter 4 in the first edition is 

found on pages 65-87 while it is found two pages later, on pages 67-89, in the second 

edition. The page references below are to pages in the first edition.] 

As stated in Part III of this review, there are only two ways of extending the Neo- 

Babylonian period to include the 20 extra years required by the Watchtower Society’s


chronology and thus also by Rolf Furuli’s so-called “Oslo Chronology”: (1) Either the 

known Neo-Babylonian kings ruled longer than indicated by Berossus, the Royal Canon 

(often misnamed “Ptolemy’s Canon”), and the Neo-Babylonian cuneiform documents, or 

(2) there were other, unknown kings who belonged to the Neo-Babylonian period in 

addition to those established by these ancient sources. The first option was discussed and 

refuted in Part III of this review. The second alternative will be examined here. 

In chapter 4 of his book (pages 65-87) Furuli presents “twelve possible Neo-Babylonian 

kings,” some of whom he suggests may have ruled somewhere between the reigns of 

Nebuchadnezzar and Nabonidus. This, he feels, would open up for the possibility that their 

combined lengths of reign could move the reign of Nebuchadnezzar 20 years backwards in 

time, as required by his Oslo version of the Watchtower Society’s “Bible chronology”. The 

names of these “possible [additional] Neo-Babylonian kings” are: 

(1) Sin-šarra-iškun (7) A king before Nabunaid 

and his son 

(2) Sin-šumu-lišir (8) Mar-šarri-us,ur 

(3) Aššur-etel-ilāni (9) Ayadara 

(4) Nadin-Ninurta(before 

Neriglissar) 

(10) Marduk-šar-us,ur 

(5) Bel-šum-iškun (father of 

Neriglissar) 

(11) Nebuchadnezzar, son 

of Nebuchadnezzar 

(6) Nabû-šalim (12) Nebuchadnezzar, son 

of Nabunaid 

The kings that Furuli suggests may have ruled as Babylonian kings during the Neo- 

Babylonian period will be discussed one by one. In order to move the reign of 

Nebuchadnezzar backwards it is important for the Watchtower Society and its Oslo 

apologist to have the supposed extra kings ruling after Nebuchadnezzar. It would not be of 

any help for them to place them as Babylonian kings before the reign of Nebuchadnezzar or 

before the reign of his father Nabopolassar. 

(1) “Sin-šarra-iškun”, (2) “Sin-šumu-lišir”, and (3) “Aššur-etel-ilāni” 

The three Assyrian kings Sin-šarra-iškun, Sin-šumu-lišir, and Aššur-etel-ilāni are well-known 

to authorities on Assyro-Babylonian history. Aššur-etel-ilāni and Sin-šarra-iškun were both 

sons and successors of Assurbanipal, and Sin-šumu-lišir was a high official at the Assyrian 

court whom Assurbanipal had appointed as tutor or mentor of Aššur-etel-ilāni, 

Assurbanipal’s heir and immediate successor to the Assyrian throne. This is information 

given by cuneiform texts from this period. The strange thing is that Furuli does not mention 

any of these facts! He does state on page 65 that the three kings are “believed to have ruled 

in Assyria after Sennacherib” (704-681 BCE). But he does not explain that they actually 

ruled after the grandson of Sennacherib, i.e., after Assurbanipal (668-627 BCE). 

Arguing that these three kings in reality may have ruled in Babylonia after the Neo-Babylonian 

king Nebuchadnezzar (604-562 BCE), Furuli first claims that they were not Assyrian but 

Babylonian kings. On page 66 he states that “the dated tablets show that they were kings in 

Babylon (not Assyria) for 7 years, 4 years, and 1 year respectively.” On page 65 he says: 

“The data regarding these kings show that they reigned at least 7, 1, and 4 

years respectively, but the tablets dated in their reigns show that they were 

Babylonian kings. This is problematic from the point of view of the traditional 

chronology, because there is no room for these reigns, even if there was 

some kind of coregency.” (Furuli, p. 65) 

By claiming that these kings were Babylonian and not Assyrian kings Furuli creates a problem 

that does not exist: If they were Babylonian kings, they cannot have ruled in Babylonia at


the same time as Nabopolassar, but must have reigned in Babylonia before this king. The 

problem created by this conclusion is that there is “no room” for their reigns of 7+4+1 

years between Kandalanu and Nabopolassar. (Furuli, p. 66) This paves the way for Furuli’s 

idea that they may have ruled after Nebuchadnezzar: 

“On the basis of the problems of finding room for these kings before 

Nabopolassar, we may ask whether one or more of these kings ruled 

Babylon during the years where we completely lack historical data, namely, 

after Nebuchadnezzar and before Nabunaid. In other words, can any of 

these kings fill a part of the possible gap of twenty years in the Neo- 

Babylonian Empire?” (Furuli, p. 67) 

The statement that we “completely lack historical data” from the period between the reigns 

of Nebuchadnezzar and Nabonidus is false. Chronology belongs to the “historical data” as 

it is the very “back-bone of history,” and the chronology of this period is completely 

known. There are also other historical data from this period. A Babylonian Chronicle, BM 

25124 (= Chronicle 6 in A. K. Grayson’s Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles, Eisenbrauns 2000 

reprint of the 1975 edition) gives information about a campaign by Neriglissar in his third 

year. Some of Nabonidus’ inscriptions also give information about his predecessors. (Paul- 

Alain Beaulieu, The Reign of Nabonidus, King of Babylon 556-539 B.C., New Haven and London: 

Yale University Press, 1989, pp. 21, 84-97, 106, 110-111, 123-125) Further, Berossus, who is 

known to have used sources from the Neo-Babylonian period, gives both chronological and 

historical information about the four kings who succeeded Nebuchadnezzar: Amel-Marduk, 

Neriglissar, Labashi-Marduk, and Nabonidus. – See Stanley Mayer Burstein, The 

Babyloniaca of Berossus (Malibu: Undena Publications, 1978), p. 28. 

Were Sin-šarra-iškun, Sin-šumu-lišir, and Aššur-etel-ilāni Babylonian kings, really? 

The claim that Aššur-etel-ilāni, Sin-šarra-iškun, and Sin-šumu-lišir were Babylonian kings, not 

Assyrian, is demonstrably false. Contemporary sources prove that all of them were Assyrian 

kings, who after the death of Kandalanu in 627 BCE attempted to retain the Assyrian 

control over Babylonia and crush the revolt of the Chaldean general Nabopolassar. Dr. 

Grant Frame explains: 

“To the best of my knowledge, of these four contenders for control of 

Babylonia only Nabopolassar ever used the title ‘king of Babylon’ or ‘king of 

the land of Sumer and Akkad,’ or was called ‘king of Babylon’ in the date 

formulae of Babylonian economic texts. In these economic texts, Aššur-etililāni, 

Sin-šumu-lišir, and Sin-šarra-iškun were called either ‘king of Assyria,’ 

‘king of (all) lands,’ ‘king of the world,’ or simply ‘king.’ The Babylonian 

scribes obviously wished to avoid stating that any of these three was a true 

king of Babylonia.” – G. Frame, Babylonia 689-627 B.C. (Leiden: Nederlands 

Historisch-Archaeologisch Instituut, 1992), p. 213. 

In a more recent work Grant Frame gives the following information about each of the three 

Assyrian kings: 

Aššur-etel-ilāni: 

“Assurbanipal was succeeded as ruler of Assyria by his son Aššur-etel-ilāni 

(or Aššur-etelli-ilāni). No inscription ever calls Aššur-etel-ilāni ‘king of 

Babylon,’ ‘viceroy of Babylon,’ or ‘king of the land of Sumer and Akkad,’ nor 

is he included in the various lists of rulers of Babylonia, which put Sin-šumulišir 

or Nabopolassar after Kandalanu. However, a number of royal 

inscriptions of Aššur-etel-ilāni do come from Babylonia and describe actions 

in that land and thus these must be included here. Over ten economic texts 

dated by his regnal years as ‘king of Assyria’ or ‘king of the lands’ come from 

Nippur and these attest to his accession, first, second, third, and fourth 

years.” – Grant Frame, Rulers of Babylonia. From the Second Dynasty of Isin to the


End of Assyrian Domination (1157-612 BC) (Toronto, Buffalo, London: 

University of Toronto Press, 1995), p. 261. 

As an example, tablet VAT 13142 calls Aššur-etel-ilāni “king of the world (and) king of 

Assyria, son of Ashurbanipal, king of the world (and) king of Assyria.” (Frame, 1995, p. 264) 

Sin-šarra-iškun: 

“The last Assyrian king to exercise any control over at least part of Babylonia 

was Sin-šarra-iškun, a son of Ashurbanipal. Exactly when he became ruler of 

Assyria and when he held authority in Babylonia is unclear, but his reign 

over Assyria ended in 612 BC. Only the Uruk King List includes him among 

the rulers of Babylonia, assigning the year following the reign of Kandalanu 

and preceding the reign of Nabopolassar (626 BC) to Sin-šumu-lišir and Sinšarra-iškun 

jointly (Grayson, RLA 6/1-2 [1980] p. 97 obverse 4´-5´). No 

known inscription gives him the title ‘king of Babylon,’ ‘viceroy of Babylon,’ 

or ‘king of the land of Sumer and Akkad.’ … 

No Babylonian royal inscriptions of Sin-šarra-iškun are attested and his 

Assyrian inscriptions will be edited elsewhere in the RIM series [The Royal 

Inscriptions of Mesopotamia] (as A.0.116). Approximately 60 economic texts 

were dated by his regnal years in Babylonia. These indicate that he controlled 

Babylon, Nippur, Sippar, and Uruk; the earliest texts come from his 

accession year and the latest from his seventh year. None of these economic 

texts, however, gives him the title ‘king of Babylon’; he is called instead ‘king 

of Assyria,’ ‘king of the lands,’ and ‘king of the world.” (Frame, 1995, p. 270) 

It should be added that, although Nabopolassar’s revolt was successful, it took some years 

before he had attained control over all cities of Babylonia. A few Babylonian cities remained 

under Assyrian control for a few years after the accession of Nabopolassar to the 

Babylonian throne. 

Sin-šumu-lišir: 

“No royal inscriptions of Sin-šumu-lišir are attested from Babylonia. At least 

seven Babylonian economic texts (including four from Babylon and one 

from Nippur) are dated by his accession year. In these he is either given no 

title, or called ‘king of Assyria’ or simply ‘king.’” (Frame, 1995, p. 269) 

The legible dates on the tablets dated to Sin-šumu-lišir are only from months III and V of 

his accession year. The Uruk King List gives the “kingless” year after the death of 

Kandalanu in 627 BCE (the last tablet before his death is dated in month III, i.e., May/June) 

to “Sin-šumu-lišir and Sin-šarra-iškun” jointly, undoubtedly because both were fighting for 

retaining Assyrian control of Babylonia this year (626 BCE). Whether both also were kings in 

this year is another question. It is known from contemporary cuneiform inscriptions that 

Aššur-etel-ilāni, not Sin-šarra-iškun, was the immediate successor of Assurbanipal. This 

information is provided by a cuneiform tablet designated KAV 182 IV. – Joan Oates, 

“Assyrian Chronology, 631-612 B.C.,” Iraq, Vol. XXVII (1965), p. 135. 

Not only the Adad-guppi’ inscription (Nabon. No. 24; see C. O. Jonsson, The Gentile Times 

Reconsidered, 4 th edition [henceforth GTR4], Atlanta: Commentary Press, 2004, pp. 113-116) 

but also Berossus state that Assurbanipal ruled for 42 years. When his brother Shamashshum-ukin 

(Berossus: Samoges), Assyria’s vassal king in Babylonia, died in Assurbanipal’s 21 st 

year (648 BCE), Assurbanipal (Berossus: Sardanapallos) “ruled over the Chaldeans for 21 

years.” (Burstein, op. cit., p. 25) This would indicate that Assurbanipal during the last 21 years 

of his reign ruled both Assyria and Babylonia, in Assyria as Assurbanipal and in Babylonia 

under the throne name Kandalanu. This is a view shared by a number of modern historians. 

His last regnal year, then, was 627 BCE and the first regnal year of his son and successor 

Aššur-etel-ilāni was 626/625 BCE. As the last tablet from his reign is dated to month VIII, 

day 1, of his 4 th year, the accession year of his brother Sin-šarra-iškun should fall in 623


BCE according to this chronology. 

Two tablets from the reign of Sin-šarra-iškun and one or perhaps two from the reign of Sinšumu-lišir 

are from Babylon. It is to be noted, however, that all of them are dated only in 

their accession years. This, too, would support the conclusion that Sin-šarra-iškun’s accession 

year fell in 623 BCE, because the Babylonian Chronicle BM 25127 (= Chronicle 2 in A. K. 

Grayson, Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles [ABC], New York: J.J. Augustin Publisher, 1975; 

reprinted by Eisenbrauns in 2000, pp. 87-90) mentions a “rebel king” in the third year of 

Nabopolassar (623/622 BCE) who ruled for “one hundred days”. For a brief period in that 

year, therefore, Nabopolassar seems to have lost control over the capital. The “rebel king” 

may have been Sin-šarra-iškun. 

With respect to Sin-šumu-lišir, prosopographical evidence strongly indicates that his brief 

reign of about three months fell in 626 BCE, before Nabopolassar’s enthronement in 

Babylon. – Rocío Da-Riva, “Sippar in the Reign of Sîn-šum-lîšir (626 BC),” Altorientalische 

Forschungen, Band 28, 2001, pp. 53-57. 

The three kings discussed above were demonstrably kings of Assyria, not of Babylonia. This 

cannot be changed by the fact that Assyria continued to retain control over a few 

Babylonian cities during the first years of the reign of Nabopolassar. There is absolutely no 

reason for trying to find room for the reigns of these three kings among the Neo- 

Babylonian rulers, neither before Nabopolassar nor after the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, as 

Furuli claims. They belonged to the Assyrian kingdom. As that kingdom continued to exist 

for seventeen years after Nabopolassar’s conquest of Babylon in 626 BCE, there was 

enough room for their rule as Assyrian kings during the final stage of Assyria’s existence. 

Furuli’s emphatic claim that “we have three kings who reigned over Babylonia for at least 11 

years who cannot be fitted into the traditional chronology of Babylonia” is completely 

groundless. (Furuli, p. 70) The Assyrian rulers during the final stage of Assyria were 

contemporary with the Babylonian ruler Nabopolassar. 

This is also confirmed by the Babylonian Chronicle BM 21901, which covers the period 

from the 10 th year of Nabopolassar until his 18th year (616/15–608/607 BCE). The 

chronicle describes the conquest and destruction of Nineveh, the Assyrian capital, in the 

14 th year of Nabopolassar and states: “At that time Sin-sharra-ishkun, king of Assyria, [died] 

… .” – Grayson’s ABC (1975, 2000), Chronicle 3: 44, p. 94. 

Thus Sin-šarra-iškun was still “king of Assyria” in the 14 th year of Nabopolassar! How, then, 

can it be claimed that he was a Babylonian king and that his reign, therefore, has to be placed 

before that of Nabopolassar, and, because there is no room for him there, it has to be placed 

after the reign of Nebuchadnezzar? The whole idea is preposterous and bears witness to an 

astounding historical ignorance on the part of Rolf Furuli. 

The same chronicle (BM 21901) goes on to tell that after Sin-šarra-iškun’s defeat at the fall 

of Nineveh (in 612 BCE) he was succeeded by Ashur-uballit, who “ascended the throne in 

[the Assyrian provincial capital] Harran to rule Assyria.” There he was finally defeated in the 

17 th year of Nabopolassar (609 BCE), and with that Assyria ceased to exist. From then on 

Babylonia was in possession of the hegemony in the Near East. – Grayson, ABC (1975, 

2000), Chronicle 3: 49-75, pp. 94-96. 

In my discussion of the attempts by scholars to reconstruct the final stage of Assyrian 

history and the reigns of its rulers, I briefly described the solution of the problems presented 

by Joan Oates in Iraq, Vol. XXVII (1965), pointing out that it had been accepted by some 

other scholars as “most probably the correct one.” (The Gentile Times Reconsidered, 4 th ed. 

[hereafter GTR4], Atlanta: Commentary Press, 2004, p. 331) In her more recent chapter on 

“The Fall of Assyria (635-609 B.C.)” in The Cambridge Ancient History (2 nd ed., Vol. III:2, 

Cambridge University Press, 1991, pp. 162-193) Oates once again develops her solution of 

the problems and also adds some new information in support of it.

The dwindling extent of Assyrian control of Babylonia after the accession of Nabopolassar 


Furuli’s description of the extension of the Assyrian control of Babylonia after the accession 

of Nabopolassar is false. He claims that “Sin-šarra-iškun reigned over a great part of, or the 

whole of Babylonia during his 7 or more years of reign”, and that “the contract tablets show 

that he was ruler over all Babylonia during his 7 or more years.” (Furuli, p. 69) 

On pages 65 and 66 Furuli states: 

“Of the 57 tablets dated to Sin-šarra-iškun, 22 are from Nippur (central 

Babylonia), 2 from Babylon (in the northeast), 9 from Uruk (in the south), 5 

from Sippar (central Babylonia), 1 from Kār Aššur, and 18 are without the 

name of the city.” 

This makes five cities, two of which were not even Babylonian cities. Strangely, Furuli 

reckons the lack of city names on some tablets as a sixth city, stating on page 67 that “tablets 

from six Babylonian cities are dated in the reign of Sin-šarra-iškun.” 

Of the five cities controlled by Assyria after Nabopolassar’s accession in Babylon in 626, 

only three were unquestionably Babylonian cities. Kār Aššur, which was situated north-east of 

Babylonia, had been constructed by Assyria in the eighth century BCE. In his first campaign 

in 745 BCE the Assyrian king Tiglath-pileser III is stated to have brought captives from 

cities in eastern Babylonia and resettled them in Kār Aššur. – A. K. Grayson in The 

Cambridge Ancient History, 2 nd ed., Vol. III:2 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 

p. 81. 

Nippur came under Assurbanipal’s control at the end of 651 BCE during the revolt of his 

brother Šamaš-šum-ukin. It remained an Assyrian city during the rest of Assurbanipal’s 

reign as shown by documents from Nippur dated by his name, while tablets from other 

Babylonian cities were dated by the name of Kandalanu during the same period. Dr. Stefan 

Zawadzki explains: 

“Consequently, regardless of whether we accept the identity of Ashurbanipal 

and Kandalanu or not, the dates clearly indicate that Nippur was not 

under Babylonian control but directly under Assyrian 

administration. This situation prevailed later also: Aššur-etel-ilāni dates 

on business documents come exclusively from Nippur. Lastly, Nippur 

remained for the longest (along with Uruk and Kar-Aššur) in the hands of 

the [next to] last Assyrian king, Sin-šar-iškun. This has led scholars to 

conjecture that Nippur could have been the site of a powerful Assyrian 

garnison established there with the aim of wielding control over central 

Babylonia. Thus, during the period from Ashurbanipal assumption (with an 

intermission of 660-651) until the end of Assyrian presence in Babylonia, 

Nippur was considered to be [an] almost integral part of Assyria. 

Therefore, the fact that documents there were dated under Ashurbanipal’s 

name cannot stand in the way of identifying him as Kandalanu.” – Stefan 

Zawadzki, The Fall of Assyria and Median-Babylonian Relations in the Light of the 

Nabopolassar Chronicle (Poznan: Adam Mickiewicz University Press, 1988), p. 

59. (Emphasis by S. Zawadzki; cf. also the discussion by Steven W. Cole, 

Nippur in Late Assyrian Times, c. 755-612 BC. Vol. IV in the State Archives of 

Assyria Studies, University of Helsinki, 1996, pp. 78-83.) 

Furuli’s claim (p. 69) that Sin-šarra-iškun was ruler over most or all of Babylonia, then, is 

false. Only a few of the many cities in Babylonia remained under Assyrian control for a brief 

period after the accession of Nabopolassar. According to the economic tablets, Sin-šarraiškun’s 

control over the city of Babylon is limited only to a part of his accession year. His 

control over Sippar is dated only until the beginning of his 3 rd year. His control over Nippur 

(which, although situated in southern Babylonia, in this period was an Assyrian city as 

shown above) lasted until his 6 th year, while his control over Uruk is dated in his accession 

year and in his years 6 and 7. After that Nabopolassar had full control over all Babylonia and



could start to attack Assyria proper in the north. – J. A. Brinkman and D. A. Kennedy, 

“Documentary Evidence for the Economic Base of Early Neo-Babylonian Society,” in 

Journal of Cuneiform Studies, Vol. 35/1-2 (1983), pp. 52-59. 

(4) “Nadin-Ninurta (before Neriglissar)” 

On pages 77-78 Furuli suggests that a king named “Nadin-Ninurta” may have ruled in the 

period after Nebuchadnezzar and before Neriglissar. This idea is based upon Furuli’s 

discussion of the Neo-Babylonian “ledger” NBC 4897 in his Appendix A (pp. 247-257 in 

the 2007 edition; 251-262 in the 2008 edition). As this ledger has already been discussed in 

Part IV of my review and the idea that line 26 may refer to some other king than Amēl- 

Marduk was thoroughly refuted, there is no need to repeat that discussion here. The claim 

that the signs for the royal name in line 26 of the ledger, transliterated LÚ- d ŠÚ, can be read 

in many different ways and refer to at least 24 different royal names is unfounded and false. 

See Part IV, section “Does the tablet indicate another king between Nebuchadnezzar and 

Amēl-Marduk?” 

(5) “Belšumiškun, king of Babylon” 

On page 80 Furuli mentions another four “possible unknown Neo-Babylonian kings,” the 

last of which is Belšumiškun, the father of Neriglissar. Furuli refers to one of the Neo- 

Babylonian royal inscriptions translated by Stephen Langdon, which he quotes as saying: 

“I am the son of Bel-šum-iškun, king of Babylon.” 

The second volume of Langdon’s work on the Neo-Babylonian royal inscriptions, however, 

which included the inscriptions from the reign of Neriglissar, was never published in 

English. The manuscript was translated into German by Rudolf Zehnphund and published 

under the title Die neubabylonischen Königinschriften (Leipzig 1912). The inscription that is 

supposed to give Belšumiškun the title “king of Babylon” is listed as “Neriglissar Nr. 1”. 

The original Akkadian text as transliterated by Langdon reads in Col. I, line 14 (pp. 210, 

211): 

“mâr I ilu bêl-šum-iškun šar bâbili ki a-na-ku” 

This is verbatim translated into German as, 

“der Sohn des Belšumiškun, des Königs von Babylon, bin Ich,” 

A literal translation of this into English would be “the son of Belšumiškun, the king of 

Babylon, am I,” rather than “I am the son of Bel-šum-iškun, king of Babylon.” 

This is probably also what was written in Langdon’s English manuscript. In W. H. Lane’s 

book Babylonian Problems (London, 1923), which has an introduction by Professor S. 

Langdon, a number of the translations of the Neo-Babylonian inscriptions is published in 

Appendix 2 (pp. 177-195). They are said to be taken from the work, “Building Inscriptions 

of the Neo-Babylonian Empire, by STEPHEN LANGDON, translated by E. M. 

LAMOND.” The last of these royal inscriptions is “Neriglissar I” (pp. 194, 195). Line 14 of 

the text says (p. 194): 

“the son of Belšumiškun, King of Babylon, am I.” 

It is obvious that this statement may be understood in two ways. Either the phrase “King of 

Babylon” refers back to Belšumiškun as king or it refers to Neriglissar himself. As no 

contract tablets have been found that are dated to Belšumiškun as king of Babylon, the 

statement is most likely a reference to Neriglissar. Do we know anything about 

Belšumiškun, more than that he was the father of Neriglissar? 

It is known that Neriglissar, before he became king, was a well-known businessman, and in 

several business tablets he is referred to as “Neriglissar, the son of Belšumiškin.” In none of 

these tablets is Belšumiškun stated to be, or to have been, king of Babylon. 

It is important to notice that Neriglissar mentions his father in another building inscription, 

“Neriglissar Nr. 2,” not as king but as “the wise prince.” The same title is also given him on


a damaged clay cylinder kept in St. Louis Library. – S. Langdon, (1912), pp. 214, 215; J. A. 

Brinkman, Alter Orient und Altes Testament, Vol. 25 (1976), pp. 41-50. 

If Belšumiškun really was, or had been, a king, why would he be degraded to the role of a 

prince, even by his own son? 

Actually, the real position of this Belšumiškun is known. The so-called “Court List,” a prism 

found in the western extension of Nebuchadnezzar’s new palace, mentions eleven district 

officials of Babylonia. One of them is Belšumiškun, who is there described as the “prince” 

or governor over “Puqudu,” a district in the north-eastern part of Babylonia. The officials 

on the “Court List” held their positions during the reign of Nebuchadnezzar. – Eckhard 

Unger, Babylon (1931), p. 291; D. J. Wiseman, Nebuchadrezzar and Babylon (Oxford: Oxford 

University Press, 1985), pp. 62, 73-75. 

So why should Neriglissar in one of his royal inscriptions call his father “King of Babylon,” 

when he had never occupied that position, and is denied that title in all other texts that 

mention him? If Furuli’s quotation, as translated from German, had been correct, a possible 

explanation could have been that Neriglissar, who had usurped the Babylonian throne in a 

coup d’état, attempted to justify his course of action by claiming royal descent. In the 

inscription where Neriglissar seems to be calling his father “the wise prince” (“Neriglissar 

Nr. 2”), this title is followed by other epithets: “the hero, the perfect, mighty wall that 

eclipses the outlook of the country.” If this description really refers to Belšumiškun and not 

to Neriglissar himself (the text is somewhat ambiguous), it would reflect a tendency to 

glorify the descent of Neriglissar. But to state in a royal inscription that Belšumiškun had 

been “King of Babylon” would have been foolish, as everyone in Babylonia would know 

that the claim was false. 

It is true that P.-R. Berger in his work Die neubabylonischen Königsinschriften (1973), in which the 

inscription “Neriglissar I” is designated ”Ngl Zyl. II, 3,” says the following on page 77 about 

the title in Col. I, line 14: 

”In Zylinder II, 3 schliesslich steht hinter dem Vaternamen der Königstitel 

b. Nach dem bisher üblichen Inschriftsbrauch wären es Aussagen über den 

Vater und nicht den Autor. Dafür würde auch die wenigstens graphisch 

präteritale Verbalform des Relativsatzes sprechen.” 

Translation: 

“In Cylinder II, 3, finally, the royal title b. [‘King of Babylon’] stands behind 

the name of the father. According to the use in inscriptions common so far, 

this would be statements about the father and not about the author. The 

graphic preterite verbal form of the relative clause, at least, would also speak 

in support of this.” 

However, it is quite clear that the phrase in Akkadian is ambiguous. This is shown, for 

example, by J. M. Rodwell, who in an article in the work, Records of the Past, Vol. V (London, 

1892), translated the phrase without the second comma sign (cuneiform, of course, did not 

use comma signs at all), so that the title “king of Babylon” is naturally given to Neriglissar: 

“son of BEL-SUM-ISKUN, King of Babylon am I”. (Page 139) 

Modern experts on cuneiform agree that this translation is just as possible as the other one. 

One of my correspondents sent a question to Dr. Jonathan Taylor at the British Museum 

about this matter. In an email dated October 25, 2006, Dr. Taylor answered:

“Dear . . .., 


While one might expect the royal title to refer here to the father -- note also 

that Neriglissar refers to himself as king only a few lines earlier -- it is not 

impossible that the title refers to Neriglissar. It is not unknown for rulers to 

conclude a paragraph with an affirmation of their kingship. … 

Jon 

(Jon Taylor)” 

The same correspondent also wrote to Michael Jursa, another well-known Assyriologist and 

specialist on cuneiform and the Akkadian language. In an email dated October 23, 2006 he 

explained: 

“Dear Mr. ---, 

the Akkadian is indeed ambiguous. If one wanted one could take ‘king of 

B[abylon]’ as referring to the preceding name, i.e. to Neriglissar’s father, 

rather than to Neriglissar himself. But the other explanation (i.e. the king is 

Neriglissar) is just as good, and we know of course that it is correct: 

the passage means ‘I am N[eriglissar], son of BSHI [Belšumiškun], the king 

of Babylon’ - or in German where this is clearer because of the case endings 

– ‘Ich bin N, der Sohn des BSHI, der König von Babylon’. It is more a 

problem of English language that a literal translation which preserves the 

word order of the original Akkadian makes BSHI a king, rather than his son. 

In Akkadian, this is not so. I am surprised that Langdon should have got it 

wrong – possibly the work of an uninformed translator who misunderstood 

the English original. 

Yours sincerely, 

Michael Jursa” 

Belšumiškun, then, was never a Neo-Babylonian king. No documents of any kind have been 

found that are dated to his reign. In the politically neutral economic tablets he is never called 

a king, and Neriglissar himself calls him “prince”, which was evidently the correct title of 

Belšumiškun. The claim that Neriglissar once, in one of his boastful building inscriptions, 

calls him “king of Babylon,” seems clearly to be based on a mistranslation. 

(6) “Nabû-šalim” 

Another “unknown king” that Furuli believes may have ruled during the Neo-Babylonian 

period somewhere after Nebuchadnezzar is named “Nabû-šalim,” or “Nabû-ušallim” as his 

name is usually spelled. In note 113 on page 78 Furuli refers to a tablet held at The 

Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery designated “1982.A.1749”. This reference is wrong. 

The correct designation is “1982.A.1772”. A copy, transliteration and translation of the 

tablet is published in an article by Dr. Michael Jursa, “Neu- und spätbabylonische Texte aus 

den Sammlungen der Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery,” Iraq, Vol. LIX (1997), pp. 97- 

174. The tablet on which the name Nabû-ušallim appears is No. 47 of the 63 tablets 

presented by Michael Jursa in the article. 

As Furuli explains, the tablet “is dated to ud.8.kam mu.4.kam id AG-GI, which is translated ‘8 

Elulu, year 4, Nabūnaid.’ However, regarding the signs id AG-GI, Jursa comments: ‘An error 

for id AG-I.” The signs for id AG-I mean “Nabonidus,” while the signs for “ id AG-GI” mean 

“Nabû-ušallim.” Thus it would seem that the tablet is dated to the 4 th year of an unknown 

king named Nabû-ušallim. 

What Furuli does not tell his readers, however, is that the name Nabû-ušallim appears at 

three places on the tablet, in lines 2, 4, and 16, and that it is only in line 16 it is used of the 

king. Lines 1-4, with the other two occurrences of the name, read (in translation from 

German):


“Three and a half shekels of silver from the ilku-debt of Nabû-ušallim have 

Nabû-taklak and Palitu, the wife of Bēl-ušallum, received from Nabûušallim.” 

Nabû-ušallim was, in fact, a well-known businessman during the Neo-Babylonian period. 

(He is not to be confused with an earlier businessman by the same name, see Hermann 

Hunger, “Das Archiv des Nabû- Ušallim,” Baghdader Mitteilungen, Band 5, 1970, pp. 193- 

304). His name appears regularly in business contracts from the 40 th year of 

Nebuchadnezzar until the 7 th year of Nabonidus. – Cornelia Wunsch, Die Urkunden des 

babylonischen Geschäftsmannes Iddin-Marduk, Vol. I (Groningen: STYX Publications, 1993), pp. 

27, 28. 

In view of this, Furuli’s claim that Nabû-ušallim may have been a king “for at least 4 years” 

– which, of course, he must place in the period between Nebuchadnezzar and Nabonidus – 

is refuted by the business documents, which present him only as a businessman during all 

these years and even longer. 

So what about id AG-GI instead of id AG-I in line 16 on the tablet? As Furuli points out, the 

close similarity between the two names appears only in the transliterated forms, not in the 

Akkadian (the cuneiform signs for Nabû-ušallim and Nabû-nā’id): 

‘We should remember that although gi and i have some resemblance in 

English, that is not the case in Akkadian. In the name of the king, gi and i are 

not letters or syllables but logograms. Thus they represent two different 

words.’ (Furuli, p. 80) 

This is true of the latter part of the names. But the first part of the names, ‘Nabû-’, is 

identical in cuneiform. It is not so strange, therefore, that the scribe, on beginning to write 

the signs for ‘Nabû-nā’id’ in line 16, inadvertently happened to repeat the name he had just 

written twice earlier in the text, ‘Nabû-ušallim.’ This kind of error, called dittography, is a 

common one. Obviously, the king intended was Nabonidus, as also Jursa rightly points out 

in his note on page 128 of his article. 

(7) “A king before Nabunaid and his son” 

On pages 76, 77 of his book Furuli believes he has found another “unnamed king” who may 

have ruled between Nebuchadnezzar and Nabonidus. He feels he has found this new king 

on a tablet at the British Museum known as “The Dynastic Prophecy.” Its museum number 

is 40623. The tablet is translated and discussed by A. K. Grayson on pages 24-37 of his 

work Babylonian Historical-Literary Texts (Toronto and Buffalo: University of Toronto Press, 

1975. On page 24 Grayson describes the contents and state of the tablet as follows: 

“It is a description, in prophetic terms, of the rise and fall of dynasties or 

empires, including the fall of Assyria and rise of Babylonia, the fall of 

Babylonia and rise of Persia, the fall of Persia and the rise of the Hellenistic 

monarchies. Although as in other prophecies no names of kings are given, 

there are enough circumstantial details to identify the periods described. … 

“The main tablet appears to have had an introductory section (i 1-6) of 

which only a few traces are preserved. After a horizontal line the first 

‘prophecy’ appears (i 7-25). Although only the ends of lines are preserved, it 

is clear that this section contained a description of the fall of Assyria and the 

rise of the Chaldaean dynasty.” 

This section ends with a horizontal line, which Furuli claims (page 77) marks the end of the 

reign of Nebuchadnezzar II. There is no evidence of this. As Grayson points out (page 24), 

the various details given “suit admirably for the reign of Nabopolassar.” 

The first three lines of the next section in column ii are damaged and illegible, but lines 4-10, 

quoted by Furuli, give the following information (the words within brackets are suggested 

restorations by Grayson, but the horizontal line after line 10 is on the tablet):

4. will go up from [… …] 

5. will overthrow [… …] 

6. For three years [he will exercise sovereignty] 

7. Borders and … [… …] 

8. For his people he will [… …] 

9. After his (death) his son will [ascend] the throne ([ … ]) 

10. (But) he will not [be master of the land]. 

________________________________________________ 


Grayson argues (pp. 24, 25) that, “Since the following section (ii 11-16) is clearly about 

Nabonidus, this paragraph must concern some period after the reign of Nabopolassar and 

before Nabonidus.” As he goes on to note, the preserved information in lines 6-10 seems to 

refer to Neriglissar and his son and successor Labashi-Marduk. That Nebuchadnezzar and 

his son Amel-Marduk (Evil-Merodach) are left out is understandable, as the “prophecies” 

focus on the rise and fall of dynasties and empires and therefore do not deal with all reigns. 

With respect to the “three years” in line 6, Grayson adds in footnote 3 on page 25: “Perhaps 

one should restore ‘(and) eight months’ in the break.” In that case line 6 would originally 

have read: “For three years [and 8 months he will exercise sovereignty].” 

Furuli’s comment on this is that, “We see that Grayson adds words and translates in 

accordance with the traditional chronology.” (Furuli, p. 76) He is wrong. In the traditional 

chronology (as for example in the “Royal Canon”) Neriglissar is given a reign of 4 years. 

What Furuli does not tell his readers is that Grayson uses the chronology presented on 

another cuneiform tablet, the Uruk King List, which gives Neriglissar a reign of “’3’ years 8 

months” and Labashi-Marduk “(…) 3 months”. (Grayson, p. 25, including n. 2; cf. GTR4, 

pp. 105-108) The preserved portions of the Uruk King List start with Kandalanu (647-626 

BCE) and end with Seleucus II (246-225 BCE). The preserved portions of the Dynastic 

Prophecy start with the gradual overthrow of Assyria by Nabopolassar after the death of 

Kandalanu and end somewhere in third century BCE. Grayson’s use of the chronology of 

the Uruk King List, then, is quite natural, as both tablets cover roughly the same period and 

seem to have been composed during the same century. 

The statement in the Uruk King List that Neriglissar ruled for 3 years and 8 months does 

not conflict with the traditional chronology. The Royal Canon (often misnamed “Ptolemy’s 

Canon”), gives whole years only, while the Uruk King List at this place gives more detailed 

information. As J. van Dijk observes, “the list is more precise than the Canon and confirms 

throughout the results of the research.” – J. van Dijk in Archiv für Orientforschung, Vol. 20 

(1963), p. 217. 

Furuli disagrees with this, stating that “we have tablets dated in the reign of Neriglissar from 

month I of his accession year until month I, and possibly month II, of his year 4. Thus 

Neriglissar reigned at least for 48 months and not just for 3 years and 8 months (44 

months).” (Furuli, p. 77) 

This claim has already been discussed and refuted in Part III of the present review of 

Furuli’s book. Fresh collations of the “anomalous” dates on the tablets used by Furuli for 

dating the reign of Neriglissar show that they are either too damaged to be legible, have 

been misread by modern scholars, or seem to be just scribal errors. The actual reign of 

Neriglissar seems clearly to have started in month V of his accession year and ended in 

month I of his 4 th regnal year – a period of 3 years and 8 months, exactly as is stated on the 

Uruk King List. 

Furuli uses the only preserved words – “for three years” – on the otherwise illegible line 6 to 

argue that they refer to another, “unnamed king” than Neriglissar who ruled for no more 

than 3 years. He says in his last paragraph on page 77:


“If the scribe gives correct information regarding the three years of reign of 

the king mentioned in line 6, this must have been a king who is not 

mentioned by Ptolemy, and who is not found in the traditional list of kings 

of the Neo-Babylonian Empire. This king also had a son who may have 

ruled as king as well. So, the Dynastic prophecy may have given us two extra 

Neo-Babylonian kings. … In any case, a king that ruled for three years is 

unknown by Ptolemy and those who accept his chronology.” 

Furuli should have added that such a king was also unknown by the astronomical compilers 

of the Royal Canon from whom Ptolemy inherited “his” Canon, by Berossus in the early 3 rd 

century BC, by the compiler of the Uruk King List in the same century, by the accountant 

who in the 1 st year of Neriglissar wrote the “ledger” NBC 4897 (see Part IV of my review), 

by Adad-Guppi’, the mother of Nabonidus, and by the scribes who wrote the tens of 

thousands of contract tablets dated to the Neo-Babylonian period. 

And, of course, the astronomical documents, in particular the five known astronomical 

tablets that records observations dated to the reign of Nebuchadnezzar – the diary VAT 

4956, the lunar eclipse tablets LBAT 1419, LBAT 1420, and LBAT 1421, and the planetary 

tablet SBTU IV 171 – inexorably block every attempt to move the 43-year reign of 

Nebuchadnezzar backwards in time in order to create room for more kings and twenty 

more years between Nebuchadnezzar and Cyrus. 

Furuli’s use of just three words (“for three years”) from an otherwise illegible sentence on a 

damaged line on the obverse of a very damaged tablet reveals how desperate and futile the 

search for the “unknown kings” is that he needs for giving his “Oslo Chronology” at least a 

semblance of credibility. 

(8) “Mar-šarri-uşur” and (9) “Ayadara” 

Among his “possible unknown Neo-Babylonian kings” Furuli mentions two names that 

were found inscribed on objects discovered during William Frederic Badè’s excavations 

between 1926 and 1935 at Tell en Nasbeh about 8 miles northwest of Jerusalem in Israel. 

The site was (and still is) identified as ancient Mizpah, the city where the Babylonians 

appointed Gedaliah as vassal ruler of Judah after their destruction of Jerusalem in 587 BCE. 

The dates of the two inscriptions are difficult to determine. W. F. Albright, George 

Cameron, and A. Sachs suggested dates that varied between the 11 th and the 5 th centuries 

BCE. (Chester C. McCown, Tell en-Nasdbeh I: Archaeological and Historical Results. Berkeley and 

New Haven: ASOR, 1947, pp. 150-152, 167-169) More recently some scholars have 

suggested that they may have been found in what is now designated “Stratum 2,” which is 

dated to the period following the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 BCE. – Jeffrey Z. Zorn, 

“Mizpah: Newly Discovered Stratum Reveals Judah’s Other Capital,” in Biblical Archaeology 

Review (BAR), Vol. 23:5, 1997, pp. 28-38, 66; also André Lemaire, “Nabonidus in Arabia 

and Judah in the Neo-Babylonian Period,” in O. Lipschits and J. Blenkinsopp (eds.), Judah 

and the Judeans in the Neo-Babylonian Period (Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 2003), pp. 

292, 293. 

Mar-šarri-uşur 

The name of the first individual was found on a potsherd. What remains of the inscription, 

which had been engraved before firing and probably is written in Hebrew, has usually been 

read as “[?B]N MRŠRZR[KN]” and is translated “[?s]on of Mār-šarri-zēra-[ukīn].” (C. C. 

McCown, op. cit., pp. 167-169) Recently, however, Professor André Lamaire has argued that 

the name could be read “[?]N MRŠRŞR[?, [?]?”, which he translates “Mar-šarri-uşur[?”. – 

André Lemaire, op. cit., pp. 292, 293. 

If the first two letters were “BN” (ben, “son”), the name of the son (the owner of the pot) is 

not preserved. If the name of his father is correctly restored as Mar-šarri-uşur, his title and 

position is not known. Furuli’s suggestion, that he was a king who reigned in Babylon, is just 

an unfounded guess. Quoting a name without a title on a potsherd found in Judah and 

suggesting that it refers to a king who may have been reigning in Babylon during the Neo-


Babylonian period is, of course, pure guesswork and a game that no scholar who wants to 

be taken seriously would run the risk of becoming involved in. The name, written in 

Hebrew characters, is either Assyrian or Babylonian, and if the inscription found at Mizpah 

dates from the 6 th century BCE, he (or his son) may perhaps have been one of the 

Babylonian officials known to have been stationed there after the destruction of Jerusalem. 

(J. Zorn, op. cit., pp. 38, 66) 

Ayadara 

The name of the second individual was found on a fragment of a slender bronze circlet with 

an incised cuneiform inscription that originally consisted of 30-35 characters, of which only 

11 are preserved. The inscription was not discovered until 1942 in Berkeley, when some 

supposedly unimportant metal fragments were cleaned in a hot bath with caustic soda and 

zinc. Jeffrey Zorn states: 

“Since only a small part of the inscription survives, its translation is 

problematic. It may have read ‘… Ayadara, king of the world, for (the 

preservation of) his life and …’ This is clearly a dedicatory inscription of 

sorts, but the words indicating what is being dedicated, and to whom, have 

been lost. Even the identification of Ayadara is unknown; no one with his 

name bearing the title ‘king of the world’ is known from any period. What is 

remarkable is that such a dedicatory inscription should turn up on a small tell 

in ancient Judah.” – Zorn, op. cit., p. 66. 

A photo of the inscription, held at the Badè Museum of Biblical Archaeology in Berkeley, 

California 

Referring to the two inscriptions, Furuli believes he has found two more “unknown kings” 

here who may have been ruling during the Neo-Babylonian period. He says: 

“Babylonian kings by the names Mar-šarri-uşur and Ayadara are unknown in 

the period covered by Ptolemy’s canon, but the discovery of these names 

suggests that two kings with these names reigned in Babylon.” (Furuli, p. 80) 

The discovery of the two names suggests nothing of the kind. 

To find out if the name “Ayadara” really is totally unknown to scholars, a correspondent of 

mine wrote to several Assyriologists and asked them if they knew anything about this king. 

One of them, Dr. Stephanie Dalley at the Oriental Institute in Oxford, England, who turned 

out to be working on texts from the Sealand dynasties, answered in an email dated 10 

October 2007: 

“The king is Aya-dara, abbreviation for Aya-dara-galam-ma, of the First 

Sealand dynasty [dated to the mid-second millennium BCE]. I am editing a 

very large archive of that king plus a few texts of his predecessor. The 

abbreviated form of the name is known from King-list A.”


The form of the name in King-list A as translated by A. K. Grayson is “A-a-dàra.” – See p. 

91 in D. O. Edzard (ed.), Reallexikon der Assyriologie und vorderasiatischen Archäologie, Band 6 

(1980). 

In a more recent letter to this author Stephanie Dalley explains: 

“Although it was certainly unexpected to find that king’s name and titles at 

Mizpah, I have no doubts about the identification. An abbreviated form of 

his name, though with a different spelling, is already known from one of the 

king-lists, and the title ‘king of the world’ is substantiated from one of Ayadara-galama’s 

year-names. The incorrect re-interpretation of readings given 

by Horowitz and Ishida contains a basic grammatical error, among other 

difficulties. All the sign values on the circlet have parallels in mid-second 

millennium texts.” – Letter Dalley–Jonsson, received December 4, 2008. 

Dalley states in her letter that more details “are forthcoming from my edition of texts from 

the First Sealand Dynasty, which is now with the publisher, CDL Press.” Clearly, Ayadara 

cannot be placed in the Neo-Babylonian period. 

(10) “Marduk-šar-uşur” 

One of the “unknown Neo-Babylonian kings” Furuli has referred to several times in the 

past first appeared in 1878 in a lengthy article by an early Assyriologist named W. St. Chad 

Boscawen. He placed the name, “Marduk-šar-uşur,” together with another mysterious 

name, “La-khab-ba-si-kudur,” in a separate “Addenda” because he was uncertain about their 

places in his chronological table. But another, contemporary scholar, Dr. Julius Oppert, 

soon discovered that the second name was simply a misreading for Labashi-Marduk, the son 

and successor of Neriglissar. – W. St. Chad Boscawen, “Babylonian Dated Tablets, and the 

Canon of Ptolemy,” Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archaeology (TSBA), Vol. VI (London, 

1878), pp. 262, 263 (including footnote 1). 

The “Marduk- šar-uşur” tablet is dated to day 23, month 9 (Kislev), year 3. However, it was 

soon discovered, this time by Boscawen himself, that the name was a misreading for Nergalšar-uşur 

(Neriglissar). This information, too, was published in the very same volume. 

Excusing himself, Boscawen explained: 

“When we have some 2,000 tablets to go through, and to read names, which, 

as everyone who has studied Assyrian knows, is the most difficult part, 

because it is not easy always to recognize the same name, as it may be 

written four or five different ways, you may judge it is an arduous task. I 

have copied two apparently different names; but afterwards found them to 

be variants of the same name.” – TSBA, Vol. VI (1878), pp. 78, and 108- 

111) 

That “Marduk- šar-uşur” was a misreading for Nergal-shar-usur was also somewhat later 

confirmed by two other early Assyriologists, T. G. Pinches and J. N. Strassmaier. 

Despite this, Furuli continued to insist that “Marduk- šar-uşur” is a possible reading of the 

name, and that he may have been an unknown king who reigned during the Neo-Babylonian 

period! 

As Boscawen did not mention the BM (British Museum) number of the tablet, it has been 

difficult to locate. Not until Ronald H. Sack published it as No. 83 (BM 30599) in his book 

on Neriglissar could it be identified – by Furuli himself! The date on BM 30599 is the same 

as that given by Boscawen, “month Kislev, 23rd day, in the third year.” In his “Addenda” 

Boscawen noted that “the contracting parties are Idina-Marduk son of Basa, son of Nursin; 

and among the witnesses, Dayan-Marduk son of Musezib.” (TSBA VI, p. 78) The same 

individuals also appear on BM 30599 (the latter not as a witness, actually, but as an ancestor 

of the scribe). It is clearly the same tablet. Sack, however, reads the royal name on the tablet, 

not as Marduk-šar-uşur but as Nergal-šarra-usur (transliterated d U+GUR-LUGAL-SHESH). –


Ronald H. Sack, Neriglissar—King of Babylon (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1994), 

pp. 224, 225. 

To check if it really is possible for a modern Assyriologist to misread the name of Nergalshar-usur 

(Neriglissar) as “Marduk-šar-uşur”, I sent an email message to C. B. F. Walker at 

the British Museum back in 2003 and asked him to take a look at the original tablet (BM 

30599). In his answer, he explains: 

“I have just taken BM 30599 out to check it, and I do not see how anyone 

could read the name as anything other than d U+GUR-LUGAL-SHESH. A 

reading Marduk-shar-usur would seem to be completely excluded. Our 

records show that the tablet was baked (and cleaned?) in 1961, but it had 

been published by T G Pinches in the 5 th volume of Rawlinson’s Cuneiform 

Inscriptions of Western Asia, plate 67 no. 4 in a copy which clearly shows 

dU+GUR. It was also published by Strassmaier in 1885 (Die babylonischen 

Inschriften im Museum zu Liverpool: Brill, Leiden, 1885) no. 123, again clearly 

with d U+GUR. So the reading cannot be put down to our cleansing the 

tablet in 1961, if we did.” (Walker to Jonsson, October 15, 2003) 

How, then, could Boscawen misread the name? Another Assyriologist, Dr. Cornelia 

Wunsch, who also collated the original tablet, pointed out in an email to one of my 

correspondents that “the tablet is in good condition” and that there is “no doubt about 

Nergal, as published in 5R 64,4 by Pinches. More than 100 years ago he already corrected 

the misreading by Boscawen.” She goes on to explain that “Boscawen was not a great 

scholar. He relied heavily on the notes that G. Smith had taken when he first saw the tablets 

in Baghdad.” 

But Furuli still seems unwilling to give up the idea that an unknown Neo-Babylonian king 

named Marduk-šar-uşur might have existed. He argues on page 80: 

“Sack read the name as Nergal-šar-uşur, and if this is the same tablet as the 

one read by Boscawen, I can confirm that Sack’s reading is correct, because I 

have collated this tablet myself at the British Museum. If both scholars read 

the same tablet, a Neo-Babylonian king with the name Marduk-šar-uşur 

never existed. However, the broken tablet BM 56709, the signs of which are 

Neo-Babylonian, refers to year 1 of a king whose name begins with Marduk-. 

So we cannot exclude that Boscawen read a tablet different from the one 

read by Sack, and that a king with Marduk in his name reigned in the Neo- 

Babylonian Empire.” 

This tablet is listed in the Catalogue of the Babylonian Tablets in the British Museum (CBT), Vol. 6 

(London: The Trustees of the British Museum, 1986, p. 215). In an unpublished list of 

“Corrections and additions to CBT 6-8” (my copy is dated March 18, 1996), which 

Christopher Walker kept at the British Museum, Walker gives the following comments on 

the text: 

“56709 Marduk-[…] 12/–/1 Dated at Borsippa. CT 55, 92 (not CT 56, 

356). 

The tablet is probably early Neo-Babylonian.” 

Note the words “probably” and “early Neo-Babylonian.” This is a suggestion. Furthermore, 

scholars often use the term “Neo-Babylonian” to describe a more extended period than 

625-539 BCE. The Assyrian Dictionary, for example, starts the period at about 1150 BCE and 

ends it in the 4th century BCE. (Cf. GTR 4 , Chapter 3, n. 1) Maybe this is how Walker uses 

the term here. The names of about a dozen Babylonian kings between ca. 1150 and 625 

BCE begin with Marduk-, including Marduk-apla-iddina II (the Biblical Merodach-Baladan, 

Isa. 39:1, who ruled in Babylon twice, 721-710 and 703 BCE), and Marduk-zakir-shumi II 

(703). Thus, as the royal name is only partially legible and we do not know exactly to which 

period the tablet belongs, it is useless for chronological purposes. Placing the king in the


Neo-Babylonian period somewhere after the reign of Nebuchadnezzar is based on nothing 

else but wishful thinking. 

(11) “Nebuchadnezzar, son of Nebuchadnezzar” 

Contemporary sources mention seven of Nebuchadnezzar’s children, but none of these 

bore the same name as their father. (D. J. Wiseman, Nebuchadnezzar and Babylon, Oxford 

University Press, 1985, pp. 9-12) Furuli’s reference to a son of Nebuchadnezzar of the same 

name is based on a much later source, a rabbinic work known as “The Chronicles of 

Jerachmeel,” written by Eleazar ben Ašer in the twelfth century CE. (English translation by 

M. Gaster, The Chronicles of Jerahmeel, London: Royal Asiatic Society, 1899) The chronicle 

relates that Amel-Marduk had become victim to a slander campaign which caused his father 

Nebuchadnezzar to sentence him to prison and make a younger son, named 

Nebuchadnezzar, king: 

“… Nebuchadnezzar the Great did not keep his faith with him, for Evil- 

Merodach was really his eldest son; but he made Nebuchadnezzar the 

Younger king, because he had humbled the wicked. They slandered him to 

his father, who placed him (Evil-Merodach) in prison together with 

Jehoiachin, where they remained together until the death of 

Nebuchadnezzar, his brother, after whom he reigned.” – M. Gaster, pp. 206- 

207; quoted by Irving L. Finkel, “The Lament of Nabû-šuma-ukîn,” in J. 

Renger (ed.), Babylon: Focus mesopotamischer Geschichte, Wiege früer Gelehrsamkeit, 

Mythos in der Moderne (Berlin: SDV, 1999), p. 335. 

Furuli uses this very late and seemingly legendary story to argue that this “Nebuchadnezzar 

the Younger” may have ruled one year as the immediate successor of Nebuchadnezzar the 

Great before Amel-Marduk came to power. (Furuli, p. 79) This is indicated, he says, by the 

conclusion (argued earlier in his chapter 3, p. 58) that Jehoiachin was released from prison 

44 years, not 43, after Nebuchadnezzar had begun to reign. This idea has already been 

refuted in Part III, section (3) of this review, to which the reader is referred. 

There may be some truth, however, to the story of Amel-Marduk’s imprisonment. This has 

been argued by Irving L. Finkel, who in his article quoted above publishes a Late 

Babylonian tablet (BM 40475) in which an individual named “Nabû-šuma-ukîn, son of 

Nebuchadnezzar” laments his grievous situation as a prisoner because of the evil trick 

played on him by his enemy. Based on another tablet, BM 34113, Finkel suggests that Nabûšuma-ukîn 

was the personal name of Amel-Marduk before he was appointed Crown Prince 

and adopted Amel-Marduk as his throne name. 

This is an interesting suggestion, but if it could be shown to be correct there is no room for 

a rule of a brother of his after the death of Nebuchadnezzar II. Finkel explains why: 

“If this suggestion is indeed correct, a terminus ante quem for the date of 

Amel-Marduk’s release and the adoption of the throne name is the month of 

Ellul, year 39 of Nebuchadnezzar, i.e. 566 BC. This information is shown by 

the contract VAS 3 25: 12-13, where reference is made to Nabû-nūrē’alūmur, 

the eunuch (´ša reši`) of Amel-Marduk, the Crown Prince (mār šarri).” 

– I. L. Finkel, op. cit., p. 338. 

If Amel-Marduk had been released from prison and been appointed Crown Prince no later 

than in the 39 th year of Nebuchadnezzar, he must have been the immediate successor at the 

death of his father in his 43 rd regnal year. This is confirmed by a number of cuneiform 

sources, including the ledger NBC 4897. (See GTR4, pp. 129-133; also 

http://goto.glocalnet.net/kf3/review4.htm.) 

(12) “Nebuchadnezzar, son of Nabunaid” 

The last of the twelve “unknown kings” that Furuli feels may have ruled during the Neo- 

Babylonian period is based on the fact that two of the usurpers that Darius I had to defeat 

during his rise to power after the death of Cambyses in 522 BCE claimed to be a son of


Nabonidus named Nebuchadnezzar. The brief reigns of the two usurpers are described in 

the Bisitun Inscription of Darius I. A number of contract tablets dated to the accession year 

and the 1 st year of Nebuchadnezzar have been identified as belonging, not to 

Nebuchadnezzar II but to the two usurpers (Nebuchadnezzar III and IV), which confirmed 

that these two usurpers really existed. So far 66 tablets have been identified as belonging to 

the two usurpers. – See my article in the British interdisciplinary journal Chronology & 

Catastrophism Review of 2006, pages 26-28, including note 8 on page 37. 

Furuli mentions these two “Nebuchadnezzars” from the early Persian period and suggests 

that a second Neo-Babylonian king by the name of Nebuchadnezzar might also lie hidden 

among the about 2,400 tablets (published up to the end of the last century) dated to 

Nebuchadnezzar II. He asks: 

“Could there have been two Nebuchadnezzars in the Neo-Babylonian 

empire instead of just one? Who can exclude this possibility?” (Furuli, p. 84) 

In support of this idea he quotes David B. Weisberg, who in 1980 expressed doubts about 

some of the criteria used to distinguish between Nebuchadnezzar II and the two usurpers in 

522/521 BCE. One of these criteria is the titles used of the kings. Nebuchadnezzar II is 

usually titled “king of Babylon,” while the title of the Persian kings usually includes the 

phrase “king of the countries.” When the latter title is used in tablets dated to 

Nebuchadnezzar, therefore, the king is supposed to be one of the two usurpers. However, 

as pointed out by Weisberg, there is one tablet in the Yale Babylonian Collection (YBC 

3437) dated to year 18 (I/30/18) of Nebuchadnezzar II with the title “king of the 

countries.” This criterion, he says, “should now be modified.” – David B. Weisberg, Texts 

from the Time of Nebuchadnezzar. Yale Oriental Series - Babylonian Texts, Vol. XVII [YOS 17] 

(New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1980), pp. xxi, xxii. 

With respect to the criterion based on prosopography, however, Weisberg admitted that it 

seems to be valid and cogent. His doubts primarily concerned whether there really were two 

usurpers who claimed to be “Nebuchadnezzar, son of Nabonidus,” or just one. – Weisberg, 

op. cit., pp. xxii-xxiv. 

David B. Weisberg’s work (YOS 17) was reviewed two years later by the French 

Assyriologist Francis Joannès in the Revue d’assyriologie et d’archéologie orientale (RA), vol. 

LXXVI, no. 1, 1982, on pages 84-92. Of the texts published by Weisberg, 38 are listed as 

dated to the accession year and the first year of Nebuchadnezzar. Of these, Weisberg assigns 

13 to Nebuchadnezzar II, one to Nebuchadnezzar III, and 17 to Nebuchadnezzar IV. 

Joannès, however, finds another two texts assigned by Weisberg to Nebuchadnezzar II that 

he on prosopographic grounds should have assigned to Nebuchadnezzar III and 

Nebuchadnezzar IV. Joannès writes: 

“The third part (pp. XIX-XXVI) concerns the distinction to make for the 

first regnal years (years 0 and 1) between Nebuchadnezzar II on the one 

hand, and the two usurpers Nebuchadnezzar III and Nebuchadnezzar IV on 

the other hand. The doubt concerns 38 texts from YOS 17, for which the 

author applies himself to make a choice, presented in a synthetic way on 

pages XXIV and XXV. I admit that I do not quite understand, in this 

context, the reasons for the long discussion devoted to Mušêzib-Bêl, son of 

Zêr-Bâbili, descendant of Ilûta-ibni (pp. XXII-XXIII). The variant Ilûtaibni/Attabâni 

is evidently interesting, but the data provided in TCL XII and 

Tum 2/3 cannot leave any doubt about the dating to make in the case of text 

8. 

“It would have been more fruitful to look into the case of Šamaš-mukîn-apli, 

son of Madânu-ahhê-iddin, descendant of Šigûa, referred to in nos. 126 and 

302, whom D. Weisberg attributes to years 0 and 1 of Nebuchadnezzar II. 

But Šamaš-mukîn-apli, the šâpiru of the prebendal brewers in Eanna, is 

attested from the 2 nd year of Cyrus to the 22 nd of Darius I. Likewise, in no. 

126, the carpenter Guzanu (l. 23) is referred to elsewhere in the 5 th year of


Cambyses. Thus no. 126 is to be dated to Nebuchadnezzar III, and D. 

Weisberg’s argument that the defeat of this king would forbid a 

contemporary attestation (here the 27, 28, 29-IX) is invalid. … 

“In a corresponding way no. 302 is dated to Nebuchadnezzar IV. It is 

important to emphasize that in such cases the title ‘king of Babylon’ or ‘king 

of Babylon and of the countries’ does not constitute a decisive criterion. It is 

the prosopography that remains the most useful one, when this is possible. 

“He does not enter into our intention to go back in detail to this problem, 

but we would like to emphasize one point: Right up to now the view 

expressed by A. Poebel permits a reconstruction that is completely coherent, 

and the elements brought up by YOS 17 certainly do not question them.” – 

F. Joannès, op. cit., pp. 84, 85; (translated from the French). Arno Poebel’s 

reconstruction is found in his article, ’The Duration of the Reign of Smerdis, 

the Magian, and the Reigns of Nebuchadnezzar III and Nebuchadnezzar 

IV,’ published in AJSL, Vol. 56:2 (Apr. 1939), pp. 121-145. 

A detailed discussion of the chronology of the three usurpers Bardiya, Nebuchadnezzar III, 

and Nebuchadnezzar IV was presented in a lengthy article by Stefan Zawadzki published in 

1994. (Zawadzki, ’Bardiya, Darius and Babylonian Usurpers in the Light of the Bisitun 

Inscription and Babylonian Sources,’ Archaeologische Mitteilungen aus Iran [AMI], Band 27, 

1994, pp. 127-145, with important details added in NABU 1995-54, 55, and 56) Zawadzki’s 

discussion is based on a detailed prosopographic research that conclusively establishes the 

existence and precise chronology of the three usurpers. For the two Nebuchadnezzars (III 

and IV) the prosopographic information presented on pages 135 and 136 of the article is 

particularly enlightening. Strangely, Furuli, who questions even the very existence of these 

two kings, seems to be totally unaware of Zawadzki’s important study. At least he never 

refers to it. 

Furuli’s theory that there may also have been a second Nebuchadnezzar who ruled during 

the Neo-Babylonian period, on the other hand, is completely groundless. He is not able to 

present any criteria whatsoever by which such a theory could be tested. 

Summary 

In the discussion above it has been demonstrated that none of Furuli’s twelve “unknown 

kings” can be inserted anywhere in the Neo-Babylonian period. Three of them were 

Assyrian kings, not Babylonian, and one belonged to the First Sealand dynasty. One royal 

name turned out to be an old misreading, three “kings” were not kings at all, and four 

others did not even exist! 

And, of course, there is no room for the insertion of any “unknown kings” or any “extra 

regnal years” into the Neo-Babylonian period. Tens of thousands of dated tablets that fix 

the length of each reign throughout the whole period, as well as several dozens of records of 

astronomical observations dated to these reigns that turn them into an absolute chronology 

make any attempt to lengthen or shorten this period impossible. All attempts to revise the 

chronology of the Neo-Babylonian period have failed and have forced the proponents of 

such revisions to either give them up or to claim that all the ancient documents that 

contradict their theories must have been falsified by later writers and copyists. When reality 

is in conflict with the theory, reality has to be rejected!

General Index 551 

General Index 

Bold page numbers indicate that a person or subject is 

treated in some detail. 

Aaboe, Asger, 156, 173, 184 

Abraham ben Hiyya Hanasi, 26 

Absolute chronology, 74, 98, 153 

”Absolute date”: used of 539 B.C.E., 80, 81 

Accession years, 87, 144, 314-317, 335, 336 

Ackroyd, Peter R., 215 

Adad-guppi’, 113-116, 125, 126, 330-332 

Adad-guppi’ stele, see Royal inscriptions 

Advent Christian Church, 45, 312-314 

Africanus,Julius, 81, 83, 84, 143, 301 

Against Apion (by Josephus): Jerusalem 

desolated for fifty years, 298-300 

”Age to come” Adventists, 43, 312-314 

Aid to Bible Understanding: article on 

“Chronology,” 19, 20 

Akibah ben Joseph, 25 

Akitu Chronicle (BM 86379), 167, 186 

Albu, John, 284, 308 

Albury Park Prophetic Conferences, 36, 37 

Alexander Polyhistor, 91 

Allenby, Edmund, 237, 258 

Almagest (by Claudius Ptolemy), 98, 99 

Amasis: reign of, 142, 143, 146, 147 

Amble, Tor Magnus, 22, 213 

Amenophis II and III (pictures), 265 

André, Béatrice, 21, 120, 322 

Anshan: city and province of, 102 

Anstey, Martin, 193 

Antiochus IV Epiphanes, 219, 245, 246, 270 

Antoninus Pius, 94, 95 

Apis: cult of, 140; stelae of, 140-142 

Apla, son of Bel-iddina (a scribe), 126 

Apostates: reject 1914, 5, 6; are to be hated, 5; 

go to Gehenna at death, 5 

Appointed times of the nations, see Times of the 

Gentiles 

Apries (= Hophra): reign of, 142-146 

Armstrong, Karen, 280 

Arnold of Villanova, 28, 29, 33 

Artaxerxes I, 73, 82, 83, 194, 320, 353, 368 

Artaxerxes II and III, 194, 360, 371 

Arthur, D. T., 39, 42, 313, 314 

Ashkelon: desolated in 604 BCE, 199 

Ashur (city of Assyria): capture of, 233 

Ashurbanipal: reign of, 113, 116, 330, 331 

Ashur-etil-ili: reign of, 115, 116, 331, 332 

Ashur-uballit II, 232, 233 

Associated Bible Students, 237 

Assyria: Final years of, 232-235, 376, 377 

Astour, Michael C., 74 

Astyages (king of Media), 102, 104, 247 

Astrology: Babylonian, 155, 332, 333 

Astronomical diaries: description of, 156, 157; chart 

of, 158; photographs of, 160, 165; VAT 

4956, 84-87, 157-164, 186, 189, 355, 359- 

362, 364, 365 ,367, 371; BM 32312, 165168, 

186, 289, 290 

Astronomy: study of Babylonian texts, 153, 154; 

observationa1 sites (with map), 154, 155; number 

and nature of tablets, 155, 156; the astronomical 

year “0”, 166; summary of 

evidence from, 185-190; reliability of tablets, 

358-364; computations versus observations, 

184,185, 364-372; dates not revised in 

Seleucid times, 163, 164, 367- 372. See also 

Astronomical diaries, Saturn tablet, Lunar eclipse 

texts, Strm. Kambys. 400 

Awel-Marduk: reign of, 98, 115, 120, 121, 124, 

131-133, 316, 323-327, 348, 349 

Babylon: fal1 of, 80, 87, 90, 214, 223-225, 329, 

376 

Bacon, John, 276 

Balfour declaration, 258, 259 

Barbour, Nelson H., 39, 44-50, 62, 68, 78 

Bardiya, 368 

Barnes, W. H., 223 

Barry, Lloyd, 8 

Barstad, Hans M., 22 

Barta, Winfried, 144, 145 

Baruch: secretary of Jeremiah, 318, 319 

Baumbach, H. Dale, 11, 12 

”B.C.E.,” use of, 4, 72, 73, 75 

Beaulieu, Paul-Alain, 98, 108-112, 138, 139, 

171, 200, 327, 328, 331, 358 

Beckwith, Roger T., 193 

Belshazzar: killed in 539 BCE, 75, 200; 1st and 

3rd year of, 247 

Bell, George, 30, 33 

Bengel, Johann A., 38 

Berger, Paul-Richard, 108, 109 

Berossus, 91-94, 97, 147, 148, 164, 189, 206, 

207, 289 ,295-300, 304, 324, 328 

Beru, Babylonian time unit (two hours), 181 

Bible Examiner (by George Storrs), 43, 49,50, 63, 

314 

Bible Students, 68, 71; periodicals of, 240 

Bickerman, Elias J., 82, 83, 90, 97, 225, 226 

Bickersteth, Edward, 38 

Bock, Darrel L., 281 

Bookkeeping: Babylonian, 131; the “ledger” 

NBC 4897 (with picture), 131-133 

Borger, Rykle, 231, 332 

Borchardt, L., 265 

Boscawen, W. St. Chad, 123-125, 135, 322 

Bowen, Christopher, 44 

Breasted, James Henry, 142, 207 

Bright, John, 234 , 235, 316 

Brinkman, John A., 96, 97, 100, 105, 136, 168, 

309 

Britton, John P., 171, 173, 177 

Brown, John Aquila, 32-36, 68, 69, 258, 276 

Bruce, F. F., 262 

Brute, Walter, 27, 33 

Bullinger, E. W., 193 

Burganger, Karl, 70, 84 

Burrows, Eric, 230 

Burstein, Stanley Mayer, 92-94, 97, 134, 206, 

324, 328 

Calment, Jeanne, see Longevity 

Cambyses: reign of, 85, 329; conquest of 

Egypt, 144; “11th year” of, 322 

Campbell, Jr., Edward F., 292-294 

Campbell, W. S., 314 

Carchemish: battle of, 146, 201-206, 232, 295, 

297, 314, 315, 318 

Chorbáh, see Desolation


Christian era, 72, 73 

Chronicles: Neo-Babylonian, 100-105, 148; 

nature of, 100; reliability of, 104, 105; BM 21946, 

101 (picture), 102, 201-203, 207, 295, 296, 339,340, 

342, 343; Nabonidus Chronicle, 102, 103 (with picture); 

BM 21901, 233; BM 22047, 346 

Chronological 1inks, 129-139, 151 

Chronology: central role in Watch Tower teaching, 

2, 5; absolute and relative, 74-76; Assyro- 

Babylonian, 97; Neo-Babylonian (tables), 98, 

117, 121, 350-352. See also Time periods: 70 years 

Clarke, I. F., 64 

Clement of Alexandria, 300 

Collins, John J., 255, 337, 338 

Conditional immortality, 43, 312-314 

Contenau, G., 120, 322 

Contract tablets, see Economic-administrative texts 

Cooper, David L., 193 

Couture, Philip, 309, 310 

Cowles, J. P., 42 

Coxon, Peter W., 255 

Cummings, Jonathan, 43 

Cuneiform: writing and tablets, 99 

Cuninghame, William, 36 

Cyaxares, king of Media, 104, 233 

Cyrus: king of Anshan, 102; defeats Media, 102-104, 

247; total rule 29 years, 103; ruled Babylonia for 9 

years, 75-79, 81, 83, 85, 100, 329; foretold, 192; 

decree of, 90, 224; “10th year” of, 322, 323 

”Cyrus Cylinder,” 90 

Dandamaev, M. A. 115, 118 ,119, 122, 124, 

126, 128, 135, 136, 234, 329 

Daniel the prophet: age of, 127; brought to 

Babylon in 605 BCE, 204-207 

”Darius the Mede,” 75, 78, 193 

Darius I, 75, 105, 124, 194, 300, 301, 368 

Dates, specific: 

776 BCE, start of Olympiad era, 82; 689 BCE, 

Sennacherib’s desolation of Babylon, 231; 652/651 

BCE, battle at Hiritu, 165-168; 610/609 BCE, 

capture of Harran and fall of Assyria, 111-113, 

232-235, 346; 607 BCE, desolation of Jerusalem 

and beginning of the Gentile times in Watch 

Tower chronology, 7, 59, 73, 77, 79, 85, 87, 89-91, 

98, 179, 191, 229, 283, 284, 291, 294, 304-311; 606 

BCE, earlier date for the beginning of Gentile 

times, 39, 40, 47, 50, 52, 53, 59-61, 78, 79, 238, 

239; 605 BCE, battle of Carchemish, and 

Nebuchadnezzar’s accession year, 20, 70, 201-204, 

209, 230-232, 319, 335; 604 BCE, 1st year of 

Nebuchadnezzar, 59, 69, 98, 124, 158; 597 BCE, 

deportation of Jehoiachin, 293, 294; 589 BCE, 

siege of Jerusalem begins, 227, 229; 587 BCE, 18th 

year of Nebuchadnezzar and the desolation of 

Jerusalem, 7, 52, 76-78 ,81, 85, 98, 113, 128, 146- 

152, 158, 159, 180, 186-190, 227-229, 236, 238, 

278, 291-294; 586 BCE, alternative date for the 

desolation of Jerusalem, 7, 76, 293, 294; 568/567 

BCE, 37th year of Nebuchadnezzar, fixed by VAT 

4956, 84, 158-160, 164; 550 BCE, fall of Media, 

103, 104; 539 BCE, fall of Babylon, 73, 75, 

78-87, 90, 103, 199, 200, 235, 251, 291, 302; 538 

BCE, first year of Cyrus, 76-79, 81, 85; return 

of Jewish exiles, 90, 223; 537 BCE, Watch 

Tower date for return of exiles, 90, 191, 200; 

536 BCE, end of the 70 years in Russell’s 

chronology, 78, 79, 81; 530 BCE, last year of 

Cyrus, 85; 455 BCE, 20th year of Artaxerxes I 

in Watch Tower chronology, 73, 82, 84, 194, 

353, 354; 445 BCE, correct date for 20th year 

of Artaxerxes I, 82, 84, 194, 353; 70 CE, 

Roman destruction of Jerusalem, 245, 279- 281; 

622, first year of the Hegira era, 32; 1798, fixed 

as beginning of “time of the end” by Adventist 

groups, 30, 274, 277, 278; changed by C. T. 

Russell to 1799, 277, 278; 1843, predicted end 

of prophetic time periods and the second 

advent, 32, 35, 38, 39, 41; later changed to 1844, 

32, 35, 39, 42; later changed by N. H. Barbour 

to 1873, date of second advent as fixed by N. 

H. Barbour, 44, 45, 49; later changed to 1874, 

14, 43-45, 49, 241; 1914, Watch Tower date for 

the beginning of Christ’s rule and end of 

Gentile times, 2-6, 39, 40 ,43, 44, 47, 48, 50, 52, 

53, 59-63, 65-71,77-79, 229, 236, 238, 241, 243, 

257-264, 266, 267, 272-278, 305, 311; end of 

Gentile times changed by PBI Bible Students to 

1934, 236-243; 1941, predicted climax of the 

“time of trouble”, 15, 276.-For tables on 

applications of the 1260 and 2,520 years, see pages 33 

and 60-61. 

Dawn Bible Students, 310 

Dean, David Arnold, 312-314 

Delaisi, M. Francis, 64 

Delitzsch, Friedrich, 207 

Belling, G., 269 

Depuydt, Leo, 94 

Desolation (chorbáh) of Judah, 191, 197 

Diakonoff, I. M., 104 

Diodorus, 81, 84 

Dionysius Exiguus, 73 

Dougherty, Raymond Philip, 91 

Drews, Robert, 94 

Drummond, Henry, 36, 37, 46 

Duffield, George, 45, 276 

Dunlap, Edward, 20, 283 

Ecbatana, capital of Media, 102 

Economic-administrative texts: discussion of, 85, 

86, 118-121, 150, 190, 289; numbers published, 

118, 119; chronological information (table), 

121; archives of, 122; copying, reading, and 

scriba1 errors, 321-323 

Edgar, John and Morton, 52, 53, 336, 337 

Edwards, T. C., 268 

Egibi business house, 122-125, 322 

Éhulhul (temple of Sin): destruction of, 111, 

112; rebuilding of, 112, 329, 330 

Elliott, Edward Bishop, 26, 27, 38, 39, 40, 44, 

62, 69, 276 

Emerson, Joseph, 276 

En-nigaldi-Nanna, daughter of Nabonidus, 109, 

110 

Enuma Anu Enlil, 110, 332, 333 

Eph’al, Israel, 197 

Epping, J., 153

Index 553 

Eratosthenes, 83 

Erlandsson, Seth, 22, 195, 213, 226 

Esarhaddon, 231 

Eusebius Pamphilus (of Caesarea), 81, 84, 91- 93, 

143, 299, 301 

Evangelical Adventists, 313 

Evans, James, 99 

Evers, Sheila M., 78, 123, 124, 322 

Evil-Merodach, see Awel-Marduk 

Faber, George Stanley, 276 

”Faithful and discreet slave”, 13, 14 

Fast: seventy years of, 227, 228 

Fatoohi, Louay J., 172 

Faulstich, E. W., 364 

Fensham, F. C., 231 

Feuerbacher, Alan, 21 

Fiala, Alan D., see Liu, Bao-Lin 

Finegan, Jack, 377 

Fishbane, Michael, 221 

Fleming, Jr., Robert, 30, 277 

Foxe, John, 29 

Frame, Grant, 167, 168 

Franz, Frederick W., 5 

Franz, Raymond, 5, 17, 19-21, 62, 283, 284 

Freedman, David Noel, 293, 294 

Freedy, K. S., 320 

French Revolution, 30, 31, 274, 277 

Frere, James Hatley, 35 

Froom, Edwin LeRoy, 24, 27, 276, 312 

Fry, John, 38, 45 

Furuli, Rolf, 308, 309; review of book by, 353-381 

Gadd, C. J., 112, 114, 115, 330, 331 

Gane, Erwin Roy, 312 

Garelli, P., & V. Nikiprowetsky, 331 

Gedaliah, 228, 229 

Generation of 1914: change of , 2-4 

Gentile times, see Times of the Gentiles 

Georgius Syncellus, 91, 92 

Gerber, M., 331 

Gilpin, Robert, 31 

Ginzel, F. K., 95, 334, 335 

Good news: Jehovah’s Witnesses on, 4 

Goodspeed, Edgar, 207 

Gottwald, Norman K., 196, 215 

Graebner, Theodore, 65 

Grant, Miles, 313 

Grasshof, Gerd, 363 

Grave stelae, 140-143 see also Apis 

Grayson, A. K., 100,104-106, 112, 116, 138, 149, 150, 

167, 168, 199, 201, 208, 233, 290, 295, 296, 319, 340, 

341, 343, 347 

”Great Disappointment,” 42, 44 

”Great tribulation,” 244 

Greenfield, Jonas C., 198 

Grew, Henry, 312, 314 

Griffin, Edward D., 276 

Gruss, Edmund C., 10 

Guinness, Henry Graham, 236, 237, 258 

Hale, Apollos, 42 

Hamath, location of, 203 

Hanson, Bengt, 12 

Hananiah: prophecy of, 207, 208, 347 

Harkavy, A., 375, 376 

Harran, capture of, 111-113, 232,233, 346 

Hartner, Willy, 330, 335 

Hasel, Gerhard F., 345 

Hastings, H.L., 313 

Hattu: location of, 230, 204; map of, 205; 

Nebuchadnezzar’s conquest of, 203, 204, 

295, 339 

Hawkins, J. D., 203, 204 

Helck, W., & W. Westendorf, 144, 145 

Henderson, J. A., 173 

Hengel, Martin, 264 

Hengstenberg, Ernst Wilhelm, 82, 298, 337, 

338 

Herald of the Morning (ed. N. H. Barbour), 45, 47- 

49, 68 

Herbst, Wolfgang, 276 

Herodotus: on the reign of Cyrus, 103, 329; on 

the reign of Astyages, 104; on the reigns of 

Amasis and Psammetichus III, 143 

Hill, John, 198 

Hillah stele, see Royal inscriptions 

Himes, Joshua V., 313 

Hipparchus, 96, 99 

Hippias, 83 

Hippolytus: on the “seven times,” 255 

Hiritu, battle of, 166, 167 

Hodson, F. R., 158, 166, 172 

Holmes, W. A. 38 

Hophra (Jer. 44:30), 139. See also Apries 

Horemheb (picture), 265 

Huber, Peter, 162, 173 

Hughes, Jeremy, 301 

Hulth, Hasse, 10 

Hunger, Hermann, 21, 156, 157, 159, 161, 162, 

167, 171-173, 175, 179, 188, 355, 359-363, 

366-371 

Hutchinson, Richard, 39 

Hyatt, J. P., 204, 316, 341 

Iddin-Marduk, son of Iqisha, 127 

Ina-Esagila-ramât, 127 

In Search of Christian Freedom (by Raymond 

Franz), 5 

Inclusive reckoning, 345n 

Inquisition: past and present, 15, 16 

Insight on the Scriptures: 

article on “Chronology” cut down, 20; 

article on the “Appointed times of the 

nations” critically examined, 243-251 

Inventory tablet SAKF 165,136-138 

”Invisible coming”: in 1844,42; in 1874, 46, 

49; about 1875,58; in 1914, 58 

Ishtar (Eanna): statue of, brought to Babylon in 

539 BCE, 138, 139 

Israel: division of the kingdom, 222; spiritual 

Israel, 259; see also Jews 

Itti-Marduk-balatu, 123, 124 

James, T. G. H., 234 

Jeffrey, Arthur, 197 

Jehoahaz, reign of, 346, 347 

Jehoiachin: deportation of, 315, 341-343; 37th 

year of exile, 348, 349 

Jehoiakim: “third year” of (Dan. 1:14,316,317, 

335-344 

Jehovah’s Witnesses-Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom 

(1993): on C. T. Russell’s predictions for 1914, 

62, 67-71 

Jenni, Ernst, 22, 211 ,214, 378,379 

Jerusalem: city of, 56,237; length of siege, 

347, 348; heavenly J., 258-260, 274 

Jesus Christ: enthronement of, 260; universal


power of, 262, 263;”waiting” at the right hand of 

God, 264-268; ruling” in the midst of his 

enemies,” 268-270; casts out Satan, 270-274. See 

also Kingdom of Christ 

Jews, Jewish: persecution stopped in 1914,56; 

immigration to Palestine, 259; nation of, restored 

in 1948, 280 

Joachim of Floris, 26-28, 33, 59 

Johnson, Paul S. L., 79, 239, 242 

Jonsson, Carl Olof: research on the Gentile times, 6, 

7; correspondence with Watch Tower 

headquarters, 7-9, 11-13; hearings with, 10-12; 

excommunication of, 16-18 

Josephus, Flavius, 92, 93, 255, 297-300, 304, 337. 

See also Against Apion 

Josiah, death of, 145, 346 

kairoí ethnôn (times of Gentiles), 278, 279 

Kákosy, László, 140 

Kandalanu: reign of, 105-107,116, 167-171, 173, 

174, 176, 177, 184, 186-188 

Keel, O., 265 

Keil, Carl F., 219, 256, 373 

Keith, B. W., 46 

Kennedy, D. A., 168 

Kienitz, Friedrich Karl, 140,142-144,320 

King lists, Babylonian, 105-108 

Kingdom of Christ, setting up of: in 1844, 42;from 

1878 onwards, 58, 257; in 1914, 58 ,257-262; at 

Christ’s resurrection, 260-274 

Kingdom of David: restoration of, 262 

Kingdom of God: in the book of Daniel, 244, 246, 

250, 251 . See also Kingdom of Christ 

Kitchen, K. A., 222 

Kohler, J., and F. E. Peiser, 125 

Koldewey, R., 108 

Kratz, Reinhard Gregor, 246 

Krecher, Joachim, 125 

Kugler, Franz Xaver, 86, 94, 96, 154, 223, 357- 359 

Laato, Antti, 104 

Labashi-Marduk, reign of, 98, 107, 120, 121, 134, 

135, 321, 322, 327-329 

Ladd, R. E., 314 

Lambert, W. G., 110 

Lamsa, G, 375, 376 

Landsberger, B, 113 

Langdon, Stephen, 108, 111 

Larsson, Gerhard, 295 

Laymen’s Home Missionary Movement (LHMM), 

237, 239-243 

Leichty, Ede, 119, 169, 355, 359 

Lengtat, Reinhard, 20 

Lepsius, R., 265 

LeQueux, W., 64 

”Let Your Kingdom Come” (1981); defends 607 BCE in 

“Appendix to Chapter 14”, 13, 284-288; appendix 

examined, 289-305 Levine, Baruch A., 222, 255 

Lewy, Hildegard, 109, 110, 115 

Life and Advent Union, 314 

Life expectancy, see Longevity 

Lindén, Ingemar, 21,42 

Liu, Bao-Lin, & Alan D. Fiala: eclipse canon of, 

176-183, 335 

Longevity: in the Neo-Babylonian period, 125-128; 

in our times, 128 

Longman III, Tremper, 116 

Luckenbill, D. D., 231 

Lunar eclipse texts (Saros cycle texts): 

discussion of LBAT 1417-1421,171-188 

Lunar eclipses: 522 BCE (on Strm. Kambys. 400), 

85,86; 554 BCE, 109-111, 310; 568 BCE (on 

VAT 4956), 162; description of, 172; 

discussion of lunar eclipse texts, 171.-188; 

penumbral eclipses, 178, 181, 183; 

retrocalculation of, 184, 185; and astrology, 

322, 323; identification of, 333-335; and 

earth’s rotation, 334, 335 

MacCarty, William, 10, 310 

MacGinnis, J., 327 

Macmillan, Alexander H., 57, 257 

Maitland, Charles, 27 

Malamat, Abraham, 125, 320, 346 

Manetho: on the reigns of Amasis and 

Psammetichus III, 143 

Marduk, 231, 247 

Mariette, Auguste, 140, 141 

Marsh, Joseph, 45 

Maspero, G., 142 

Masoretic text (MT), of Jeremiah: reliability of, 

195, 196, 309 

Matthias, Barnett, 42 

Mede, Joseph, 36 

Meeus, Jean, & Hermann Mucke: eclipse canon 

of, 335 

Megasthenes, 91 

Meissner, Bruno, 122 

Mercer, Mark K., 341 

Meyer, G. B., 258 

Meyer, Eduard, 96 

Millenarians, millennialists, 65 

Miller, Molly, 104, 144 

Miller, William, 39, 41, 42 

Millerite movement, 32, 39 

Mitchell, H. G., 226 

Mitchell, T. C., 90 

Morgan, G. Campbell, 258 

Morgenstein, Julian, 320 

Morrison, L. V., 334 

Mowinckel, Sigmund, 320 

Mushezib-Marduk, 133 

Nabon. H1, B, see Royal inscriptions 

Nabon. Nos. 8, 18, 24, see Royal inscriptions 

Nabonassar, 93, 94, 96, 100, 369 

Nabonidus: reign of, 75, 80, 90, 102-104, 110, 

119-121, 124, 135-139, 328, 329, 356-358; 

exiled to Carmania, 200; “Verse Account” of 

247; “Prayer of Nabonidus”, 255 

Nabonidus Chronicle, 80, 81, 102, 116, 135, 136, 

139 

Nabopolassar: reign of, 90, 98, 100, 102, 115, 

129, 130, 168, 171, 186, 187; defeats 

Assyria, 234; death of, 203,206 

Nabû-ahhê-iddina, 123, 124, 129, 135 

Nahawendi, 25 

Napier, John, 30 

Nebuchadnezzar II: reign of, 73, 76-78, 115, 

120, 121, 124, 129-133, 153, 178-190, 323325; 

conquest of Egypt, 146, 147; 37th year (on 

VAT 4956), 84-87, 157-164; reign fixed by 

lunar eclipses, 177-185; defeats Necho at 

Carchemish, 201-206, 319; subjugates Hattu, 

203-205, 295-298; portrait of, 202; “head of 

gold,” 238; “seven times” of, 243-256, 248

Index 555 

(picture); activities of, 249, 253, 254 (table) 

Nebuzaradan, 228, 229 

Necho(h) II: reign of, 139, 142-146; defeated at 

Carchemish, 201-204, 233-235 

Nemet-Nejat, K. R., 131-133 

Neo-Babylonian period: definition of, 90, 102 

Neriglissar: reign of, 98, 107, 115, 119-121, 

124, 133-135, 322, 325-327 

Neugebauer, Otto, 74, 96, 154, 155, 157, 161, 173, 

333, 364, 365 

Neugebauer, P. V., 157, 163, 361 

Neumann, H., 255 

Newton, Isaac, 78 

Newton, Rober1 R., 99, 334, 335 

Nisan and Tishri years, 317-320 

Nissen, H. J., et al, 131 

Nolland, John, 281 

Nonaccession years, see Accession years 

Nur-Sîn (business house), 122, 125 

Oates, Joan, 331, 332 

Oberhuber, Karl, 137, 138 

Olmstead, AT., 93, 184 

Olshansky, S. Jay, 128 

Olympiad Era, 81-84 

Oppenheim, A. Leo, 115, 116, 147 

Oppolzer’s Canon, 335 

Orr, Avigdor, 215, 221 

”Oslo Chronology” (of Furuli), 353-381 

Overlapping dates, 308, 323-329, 355-358 

Palmer, R. R., 31 

Pannekoek, A., 332 

Parker, Richard A., 143 

Parker, R. A., & W. H. Dubberstein: on 

Babylonian Chronology, 98, 119, 120, 225, 228, 

320, 323, 356-358 

Pastoral Bible Institute (PBI), 237-243 

Payne, J. Barton, 303 

Peat, Jerome, 136, 329 

Pelusium, 298 

Penton, James, 21, 47 

Persson, Rud, 21 

Petavius, Dionysius, 82, 353 

Peterson, E. H., 373 

Pieters, Albertus, 207, 297, 315, 344 

Pinches, T. G., 136, 140, 156, 173, 358 

Ploeger, Charles, 20 

Plöger, Otto, 215, 225 

Plummer, Alfred, 279 

Plutarch, 83 

Pognon, H., 113 

Polyhistor, Cornelius Alexander, 92 

Porten, B., 317 

Pritchard, James B, 90, 106, 134,247, 328 

Prosopographical evidence, 121-128, 151 

Psammetichus, grave stelae of, 142 

Psammetichus I: reign of, 142-145; assists 

Assyria in 616 BCE, 232 

Psammetichus II & Ill, reigns of, 142-145 

Ptolemy, Claudius, 78, 94-99, 148, 161 

”Ptolemy’s Canon,” 78, 79, 81, 82, 84. See also 

Royal Canon 

Pym, William, 38 

Rashi, Rabbi, 26 

Rassam, Hormuzd, 119 

Rechabites, 208 

Redeker, Charles F., 310 

Redford, D. B., 320 

Resurrection, heavenly: dated to 1878, 58; 

moved to 1918, 58 

Revillout, E., 144 

Riblah, location of, 203 

Rice, D. S., 113 

Rochberg-Halton, Francesca, 333 

Röllig, W., 328 

Roman empire: the fourth kingdom, 268 

Roth, Martha T., 125 

Royal Canon (or, “Ptolemy’s Canon”): discussion 

of, 91, 94-98, 95 (picture), 116, 148, 163, 

189, 289 

Royal Chronicle, 110, 149 

Royal inscriptions, Neo-Babylonian: extant 

number of, 108; arrangements of, 109; Nabon. 

No. 18, 109-111, 310; Nabon. No. 8 (Hillah 

stele), 111-113,189,289,329,330; Nabon. No. 24 

(Nabon. H 1, B, or the Adad-guppi stele), 112- 

116, 189, 289, 331, 332; summary, 149, 150 

Rusk, Fred, 8 

Russell, Ann Eliza (Birney), 47 

Russell, Charles Taze, 39, 43, 47-58, 60-62, 

66, 68, 79, 237, 253 

Russell, Joseph L., 47 

Russell, Philemon R., 39 

Rutherford, Joseph F., 58, 79, 237, 257-259 

Sandia ben Joseph, 25 

Sabbatical years (and rest of land), 222, 223 

Sachs, Abraham J., 20, 21, 154,156-159, 162, 

165-167, 171-174, 183, 184, 333, 355 

Sack, Ronald H., 91, 108, 118, 129, 130, 133, 

323, 325, 327 

Saggs, H. W. F, 112 

Saite period: chronology of, 140-145 

Samuel, Alan E., 83 

Saros Canon (BM 34597), 184 

Saros cycle, 171, 173, 177, 178, 330 

Satan: cast out of heaven, 270-274 

Saturn, observations of: 159, 161, 162, 169-171, 

188, 189 

Saturn Tablet, 169-171, 186, 190 

Schaumberger, P. J., 154 

Schmidt, E. F., 194 

Schmidtke, Friedrich, 96, 97 

Schnabel, Paul, 92, 94 

Schramm, W., 116 

Schreckenberg, Heintz, 299 

Schroeder, Albert D., 8 

Second Adventists, 42, 312-314 

Seder Olam Rabbah, 193, 301, 338 

Seeley, Robert, 69 

Seiss, Joseph A., 46, 69 

Seleucid era, 162, 164, 172 

Seleucus II, 106 

Sennacherib, 97, 116, 174, 231 

Septuagint (LXX): on Jer. 25:1-12, 195, 196, 375, 

377-379; on Jer. 29:10, 213, 214; on Dan. 

12:1, 244; on Dan. 4, 255; omits Jer. 52:28- 

30,315 

Seven times, 35, 36, 38, 39, 69, 89, 243-256 

Seventh-Day Adventists, 42, 312 

”Seventh month movement,” 42 

Seventy years, see Time periods: 70 years 

Shamashshumukin, reign of, 100, 116, 166-168, 

173-177, 184, 186, 322 

Shea, William H., 343


Shiff, Laurence Brian, 125 

Shula (Sula): head of Egibi firm, 123, 124 

Sign, of Christ’s “presence,” 275, 276 

Sippar Cylinder, 112, 247 

Smalley, Gene, 284 

Smith, George, 78, 123 

Snow, Samuel, 42 

Soderlund, Sven, 196 

Sogdianus, 368 

Solar eclipse: in 585 BCE, 104 

Solomon ben Jehoram, 25 

Spiegelberg, W., 143 

Stager, Lawrence E., 199 

Stele, John M., 22, 86, 150, 173, 176, 184, 185, 187, 

359, 365, 366 

Stephenson, F. Richard, 110, 172, 334 

Sterling, Gregory E., 92 

Stern, Menahem, 207 

Stern, Sacha, 317 

Stetson, George, 47 

Storrs, George, 42, 47-50, 193, 312-314 

Strassmaier, J. N., 153, 173, 357 

Streeter, R. E, 237, 239 

”Strm. Kambys. 400,” 85-87, 359, 360 

Stuhlmueller, Carrot, 227 

Svensson, Rolf, 10 

Swerdlow, N. M., 169, 185, 362, 365 

Swingle, Lyman, 283 

Synchronisms: between Babylon, Judah, and Egypt, 

139-147, 151, 153 

Tabouis, G. R., 202 

Tadmor, Hayim, 109, 330, 346 

Taharqah, reign of, 141 

Talmon, Shemaryahu, 246 

Terry, Milton S., 252, 279 

Tertullian, 193 

Thackeray, H. St. J., 93, 299 

The Christian Quest (ed. James Penton), 46 

The Midnight Cry (by N. H. Barbour), 45-47 

The Prophetic Times (ed. J. A. Seiss et al), 46, 69 

The Rainbow (ed. William Leask), 46 

Theodoret, on the “seven times,” 255 

Theodotion: version of, 255; on Dan. 12:1,244; 

on the seven times at Dan. 4, 255 

Theophilus of Antioch, 300 

Thiele, Edwin R., 223, 317, 320, 345, 346 

Thirty Years’ War, 31 

Thompson, J. A., 197, 227, 315 

Thompson, R. Campbell, 87, 88, 321 

Thutmosis III (picture), 265 

Timaeus Sicilus, 83 

”Time,” Greek kairós, 244, 255, 256; Aram. ‘iddan, 

253, 255, 256 

”Time of the end”: 1798-1873,45; not the “End of 

Time,” 246; 1866-1941, 276 

”Time of trouble”: will begin in 1910 and end in 

1914,51; wil1 end after 1914,51; “a class struggle,” 

55; beginning moved to 1914, 56; will culminate 

in 1941, 276 

Time periods: 

3 1/2 days (Rev. 11:8), 26; 40 year-days (Num. 

14:34; Ez. 4:6), 24; 390 year-days (Ezek. 4:5), 24; 

70 weeks (Dan. 9:24-27), 25; 192-194, 246; 42 

months (Rev. 11:2), 279; 7 times (Dan. 4), see 

Seven times; 70 years, 76-79, 191, 194-235, 238, 

295-304, 

355, 372-382; 1242 (Julian) years, 33 (table); 

1260 (lunar) years, 32, 33 (table), 69; 1260 

years, 26-32, 33 (table), 35, 36, 44, 47, 59, 

252, 253, 256, 276; 1290 years, 25-29, 33 

(table), 44, 59, 252; 1335 years, 25, 26, 44, 

252, 276; 2300 years, 25, 26, 32, 35, 41; 2450 

years, 59, 60-61 (table); 2452 years, 59, 60- 

61 (table); 2520 years, 23, 24, 32, 35, 36, 38- 

41, 43, 47, 48, 50, 52, 53, 59, 60-61 (table), 

69, 79, 89, 236, 238, 243, 246, 249-253, 256- 

259, 278, 306; 6000 years, 44 

Times of the Gentiles, 4, 6, 23, 24, 28-30, 32, 

36, 38, 39, 47, 50, 60, 61, 67-70, 77, 79, 89, 

230, 236-244, 257-260, 276, 278-282. 

Tishri years, 317-320 

Toomer, G. J., 94, 99 

Torrey, R. A., 65 

Tregelles, Samuel P., 252 

Trinity doctrine, 43 

Turner, Joseph, 42 

Tyre: seventy years of, 195, 231 

Umman-manda (= Medes), 112, 233 

Ungnad, Arthur, 123, 125 

Uruk King List: on Labashi-Marduk, 98, 107; 

discussion of, 105-108; 326,327 

USH, Babylonian time unit (four minutes), 175 

Ussher, James, 52, 78, 82 

van der Waerden, Bartel L., 159-162, 333 

van Dijk, J., 106, 107, 124 

van Driel, G., 123, 131-133 

VAT 4956, see Astronomical diaries 

Victorinus, 26 

Voigtlander, E. N., 100 

von Bismarck, Otto, 63 

Vulgate version, 378, 379 

Waddell, W. G., 143 

Wagebald, Michael, 64 

Walker, C. B. F., 21, 169-171, 321, 323, 326, 

357, 359 

Walker, P. W. L., 280 

Walters, Al, 246 

Watch Tower Society: claims of, 2, 3, 13-15, 

18, 19, ,275, 305-307 

Weidner, Ernst F., 157, 163, 361 

Weingort, Saul, 125 

Weisberg, David B., 324 

Weissbach, F. H., 322, 323, 357 

Wellcome, Isaac C., 43, 313 

Wendell, Jonas, 45, 47,49 

Wendell, Rufus, 314 

Whiston, William, 299, 300 

White, Ellen G., 312 

Willis, D. M., 361 

Wilson, Benjamin, 46,314 

Wilson, Curtis, 362 

Wilson, Dwight, 65,280 

Wilson, Gerald H., 216 

Winckler, Hugo, 207 

Winkle, Ross E., 235, 354 

Wiseman, Donald J., 2l , 75, 100, 118, 119, 184, 

201, 204, 207, 232, 234, 249, 255, 256, 318, 

322, 323, 346, 347 

Woman, in heaven, 271 (picture), 272 

World War I: “a major turning point,” 31; 

expectations for, 50, 51; expectations not 

fulfilled, 55-57, 257; reinterpretation of, 58; 

year of not foreseen, 63, 276-278

Index 557 

World’s Crisis, 43, 45, 312, 313 

Wright, G. Ernest, 292 

Wunsch, Cornelia, 127 

Xerxes, 82, 194, 368 

Yahweh, Jehovah, 22 

Yamauchi, Edwin M., 194 

Year-day principle, 24, 251-253 

Young, Edward J., 192, 245, 255, 270, 345 

Zagros mountains, 363 

Zawadzki, Stefan, 136, 233, 324, 327 

Zedekiah, reign of, 73, 347 

“Zero year,” 79, 166 

Zevit, Ziony, 198 

Zodiacal belt, 361, 362 

Scripture Index 

Where the page number is in italics this indicates that 

the text reference is in a footnote. Where the page 

number is in bold, this indicates that the passage is 

discussed in some detail. 

Genesis 

5:12 231 

7:4 252 

11:26 231 

46 231 

50:3 231 

Exodus 

1:5 231 

15:27 231 

24:1 231 

Leviticus 

25:1-7 222 

25:3,4,8,9 25 

25:8-28 223 

26:12-28 36 

26:31,33 197 

26:34,35 222 

Numbers 

11:16 231 

14:34 24, 252 

Deuteronomy 

10:22 231 

30:1-6 218 

Judges 

1:7 231 

8:30 231 

12:14 231 

2 Kings 

10:1 231 

22:2-23:23 318 

22:3-10 318 

23:21-23 318 

23.29 139, 145 

23:29,30 346 

23:31-35 203 

23:34-37 338 

24:1,2 204, 208, 209, 298, 338, 339,341 

24:1-7 230, 341 

24:7 204, 235 

24:8-17 342 

24:10-12 343 

24:10-17 210, 296, 349 

24:11,12 254 

24:12 130, 315, 325 

24:14 - 296 

24:18-25:30 315 

25:1 227, 254, 347 

25:1,2 229 

25:1-4 348 

25:2-4 229 

25:2,8 73, 87, 91, 153 

25:6,20-21 203 

25:8 293, 294, 315 

25:8,9 229 

25:8-12 318 

25:22-25 229 

25:27 348 

25:27-30 254, 316 

2 Chronicles 

3.5:20-25 346 

36:1 346 

36:6 343 

36:7, 10, 18 341 

36:9,10 342, 343 

36:10 130, 254, 325, 349 

36:20-23 221-225 

36:20 200,223 

36:20,21 214, 372, 373 

36:21 90, 336 

36:21-23 302 

36:22,23 75 , 90,224, 225 

Ezra 

1:1-4 75, 79, 90, 192 

1:1-3:1 90, 200 

1:5-2:70 90 

3:1 90 

3:1,2 303 

3:8-10 303 

4:24 300 

Nehemiah 

1:1 319 

2:1 320, 353 

2:17 197 

Psalms 

2:1-3 272 

2:6-9 272 

90:10 128, 231 

103:19 250 

110:1,2 260, 264, 266, 267 

110:5,6 268 

145:13 250 

Isaiah 

14:12-15 270 

23:15 231 

23:15-18 195 

44:28 192 

45:1 251 

45:13 192 

49:19 197 

Jeremiah 

1:3 318


9:11 197 

25:1 201, 203, 247, 254, 295, 315, 344 

25:1-12 195 

25:10-12 76-78, 90, 195-204, 207, 209, 

214, 226, 229, 238, 297, 301-304 

336, 372, 374 ,375 

25:19-26 231 

27:1,3,12 207 

27:2 207 

27:7 232, 374, 375 

27:7-9,11 198 

27:17 199 

28:1 207, 210, 254 

28:1-4 347 

28:2,3 208 

28:10,11 208 

29:1,2 210 

29:1,20 217 

29:1-30 254 

29:1-32 216 

29:8,9 210 

29:10 76, 77, 90, 209-215, 217, 219, 

224-226, 229, 230, 235, 302, 

336, 372, 373, 375-379 

29:12-14 218 

32:1,2 254 

34:22 197 

35:1 208 

35:11 208 

36:1-6 318, 319 

36:1-32 196 

36:9 319 

36:22 377 

36:29 196 

39:5-7 203 

40:13-41:10 229 

43:10f. 254 

44:22 197 

44:30 139, 146 

46:2 139, 146, 201, 203, 204, 234, 254, 

314, 316, 318, 335, 338, 344 

47:5-7 199 

51:64 315 

52:4 227 

52:4-16 254 

52:6,7 229 

52:9-27 203 

52:12 91, 293, 315 

52:12,13 228 

52:28 254 ,315, 325 

52:28,29 294 

52:28-30 296, 297, 315 

‘ 52:29 91, 293 

52:31 316, 325, 348 

52:31-34 254, 316 

Ezekiel 

4:6 24, 252 

8:11 231 

21:27 257, 258 

24:1,2 227, 347 

26:1,7 254 

29:1-20 254 

33:21 348 

33:24,27 197 

36:34 197 

Daniel 

1:1 207, 238, 241, 242, 254, 316, 318, 344 

1:1,2 206, 208, 229, 293, 298, 302, 335-345 

1:1,4,6 127 

1:1-4 204, 209, 230, 295, 304, 342 

1:2 205 

1:3,4 297 

1:21 127 

2:1 206, 229, 230, 241, 242, 247, 

254, 302, 304, 337-339, 344 

2:1,37,38 238 

2:8,9 253 

2:21 250, 253 

2:36-44 268 

2:44,45 246 

3:5,15 253 

4 236, 244-256 

4:3, 34-37 251 

4:16,23,25,32 244, 255, 256 

4:17 250, 251 

4:26,36 253 

4:28 245 

4:29 247 

4:30 247,249 

4:33 245 

5:26-31 75, 215 

5:30 200 

5:31 300 

6:28 75 

7:1 247, 344 

7:12 253 

7:13,14,18,22,27 246, 264 

7:25 253, 256 

8:1 247, 344 

8:1-4, 20 247 

8:9-12 270 

8:9-14,23-26 246 

8:10,11 245 

8:14 25,32 

8:17, 19 246 

9:1 75, 247, 344 

9:1,2 215-220, 300 

9:2 25, 78, 90, 219, 220, 336, 372, 373 

9:3 218 

9:4-19 216, 217 

9:11 218 

9:13 218 

9:24 25 

9:24-27 25, 82, 192, 252, 353, 354 

9:27 244, 245 

10:1 127, 247, 344 

10:2,3 25 

11:13,27,35,40 246 

11:31 244, 245 

11:36,37 245 

12:1 244, 245 

12:1-3 246 

12:7,11,12 252 

12:11 25, 28, 244, 245

Index 559 

12:11,12 25 

Amos 

5:18-20 246 

9:11f. 262 

Jonah 

3:4 252 

Haggai 

1:1,14,15 225 

2:18,19 226 

Zechariah 

1:7 226 

1:7-12 225-227 ,229, 230, 304 ,380 

1:12 226, 227, 379, 380 

1:16,17 227 

7:1 228 

7:1-5 225, 228-230, 304 

7:5 242, 379, 380 

8:19 229 

Malachi 

1:4 197 

Matthew 

4:13-16 270 

5:34 264 

7:15-23 11 

18:16 284 

18:20 19 

21:43 281 

24:14 4 

24:15 244, 245 

24:21 244, 245 

24:34 2 

24:37,39 46 

24:45-47 14 

24:47 13 

26:64 264 

28:18 262, 272 

Luke 

1:32 262 

1:51,52 251 

10:1,19 271 

10:15 270 

10:17,18 271 

21:24 4, 23, 28, 36, 59, 69, 89, 243, 

244, 256, 259, 278, 280, 281 

22:69 264 

John 

3:13 262 

6:68 19 

9:30, 34-39 19 

12:31 271 

17:21-23 19 

Acts 

4:25-28 272 

10:1-48 281 

13:32,33 272 

15:13-18 262 

Romans 

1:4 272 

11:25 281 

1 Corinthians 

15:24,25 267, 268 

15:24-26 269 

15:24-28 266 

15:25 266 

Ephesians 

1:20-23 263 

1:21,22 269, 272 

2:1,2 269 

6:12 269 

Colossians 

1:13,14 260, 261, 269 

1:15, 16 269 

2:10 263 

2:15 269 

3:14 18 

2 Thessalonians 

2:3-5 245 

Hebrews 

1:5 272 

2:8 269 

2:14,15 270 

5:5 272 

8:1 264 

10:12,13 266 

10:13 267 

11:1 291 

12:2 264 

1 Peter 

3:15 307 

3:22 269 

1 John 

1:3 19 

Revelation 

1:5 263 

2:10 27 

2:26,27 273 

3:21 260, 262, 264 

7:3 52 

11:2 28, 35, 279 

11:2,3 252 

11:3 27, 28 

11:15 261 

11:15-18 272 

11:17,18 258 

11:19 26 

12:1-6 258, 272 

12:1-10 260 

12:1-12 271-273 

12:5 272, 273 

12:6,14 28, 30, 252, 256 

12:7-12 273 

12:9,10 273 

12:13-17 273 

16:8,9 277 

22:1,3 264

The Gentile Times Reconsidered Chronology Christ

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